US states that drink most alcohol

New data has revealed which US states consume the most alcohol, with California coming out on top

The report, released by the National Drug Helpline, has identified the US states that drink the most alcohol by volume, the most beer and wine, and those with the highest number of alcohol-related driving deaths.

California has been named as the state that consumes the most alcohol by volume.

New Hampshire was found to be the state with the highest consumption of beer and wine in the country, with a total average alcohol consumption of 4.67 gallons per person per year, followed by Delaware, Nevada, North Dakota and Montana.

North Dakota was revealed to have the highest percentage of adults who drink excessively.

The state was also found to have the highest percentage of alcohol-related driving deaths.

Almost one-third (30%) of all driving fatalities in the country are attributed to alcohol-impaired driving, however 46.7% of road deaths in North Dakota were credited to alcohol.

Geographical and social influences

The data has also revealed the five states that drink the least alcohol, with Utah being the driest state across the country, followed by West Virginia, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Georgia.

Surveys have found that geographical location can play a vital role in alcohol consumption, excessive alcohol intake, and alcohol-related driving deaths.

It has been revealed that states with low-income populations have lower rates of excessive drinking. For example, Tennessee and West Virginia, which have some of the lowest rates of excessive drinking in the country, also have a median household income of US$58,516 and US$50,884 respectively, which is well below the national average of US$70,784.

Meanwhile, states with a high median household income, such as New Jersey (US$89,703) and Massachusetts (US$89,206), feature among the top wine consuming states in the US.

Faith and religion have also been found to play an important role in a state’s consumption of alcohol. For instance, the low drinking rates in Utah can be attributed to half the state’s population being Mormon, a faith that prohibits alcohol.

Nationwide data

The report also looked into overall alcohol consumption across the US, and found that more than 85% of people over the age of 18 have reported drinking alcohol at some point in their lifetime, with seven in 10 Americans admitting to drinking in the last year.

More than half of all men and woman and reported drinking alcohol in the past month.

Furthermore, it was found that alcohol is responsible for nearly a fifth of emergency department visits in the US, with more than 140,000 men and women dying from alcohol-related causes each year.

This makes alcohol the fourth leading preventable cause of death in the US.

The misuse of alcohol is believed to cost the US$249 billion each year, according to 2010 data. Three-quarters of this cost is on account of binge drinking.