This Is America’s Drunkest City

Is a single drink good for you, or bad for you? The answer is “yes” unless it is “no.” After many studies that say a drink can be good for the heart, or as a preventive measure for cancer, a recent study showed that it is best to not drink at all. According to NPR,” No amount of alcohol is safe, according to The Global Burden of Diseases study, which analyzed levels of alcohol use and its health effects in 195 countries from 1990 to 2016.”

For Americans to cut their intake to zero would change the face of social interaction. Alcohol sales in 2020 rose by the largest amount since 2002. The sales of some categories rose well into the double digits. The trend continued in the first half of last year. Sixty percent of Americans drink, and average drinks per week are over three.

Each year, alcohol abuse is directly linked to diseases and accidents that kill an estimated 95,000 Americans. Excessive drinking also costs the economy hundreds of billions of dollars annually, mostly in lost productivity.

Some drinking habits take a toll on American health. According to the CDC, the lifespan of heavy drinkers is 28 years shorter than for the overall population. One particularly dangerous habit is binge drinking. “Binge drinking is responsible for almost half the deaths and three-quarters of the costs due to excessive alcohol use.”

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Using data from County Health Rankings & Roadmaps, a joint program between the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute, 24/7 Tempo identified the U.S. metropolitan area with the highest excessive drinking rate. In every metro area we considered, more than 22% of adults drink excessively, while nationwide, the excessive drinking rate is 19.2%

Metro areas were evaluated based on the share of adults who either binge drink or drink heavily. CHR defines binge drinking as consumption of more than four drinks in a single occasion for women and more than five drinks for men, while heavy drinking is defined as more than one drink a day on average for women and more than two drinks a day for men.

Appleton, WI is America’s Drunkest City. Here are the details:

Adults binge or heavy drinking: 30.8%
> Driving deaths involving alcohol: 31.1% — 124th highest of 384 metros (tied)
> Median household income: $68,335 — 84th highest of 384 metros
> Adults reporting poor or fair health: 13.5% — 25th lowest of 384 metros

Methodology: To determine America’s drunkest metros, 24/7 Tempo reviewed rates of excessive drinking from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute joint program’s 2021 County Health Rankings & Roadmaps report.

The rate of excessive drinking is defined as the share of adults who report either binge drinking or heavy drinking in the past 30 days. Binge drinking is defined as a woman consuming more than four drinks or a man consuming more than five drinks in a single occasion. Heavy drinking is defined as a woman consuming more than one drink per day on average or a man consuming more than two drinks per day on average.

We aggregated county-level statistics to metropolitan statistical areas. While the CHR report is from 2021, excessive drinking rate figures published in the report are from 2018.

We used the 384 metropolitan statistical areas as delineated by the United States Office of Management and Budget and used by the Census Bureau as our definition of metros.

Metros were ranked based on the excessive drinking rate. Additional information on the share of driving deaths with alcohol involvement and the share of adults that report fair or poor health are also from the 2021 CHR. Median household income data are one-year estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2019 American Community Survey.

Click here to read America’s Drunkest  Cities

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