Long-Term Trends (1994–2011) and Predictors of Total Alcohol and Alcoholic Beverages Consumption: The EPIC Greece Cohort

Abstract

The aim of this study was to evaluate the longitudinal changes in alcohol consumption (total alcohol and types of alcoholic beverages) of the Greek EPIC cohort participants (28,572) during a 17-year period (1994–2011), with alcohol information being recorded repeatedly over time. Descriptive statistics were used to show crude trends in drinking behavior. Mixed-effects models were used to study the consumption of total alcohol, wine, beer and spirits/other alcoholic beverages in relation to birth cohort, socio-demographic, lifestyle and health factors. We observed a decreasing trend of alcohol intake as age increased, consistent for total alcohol consumption and the three types of beverages. Older birth cohorts had lower initial total alcohol consumption (8 vs. 10 g/day) and steeper decline in wine, spirits/other alcoholic beverages and total alcohol consumption compared to younger cohorts. Higher education and smoking at baseline had a positive association with longitudinal total alcohol consumption, up to +30% (vs. low education) and more than +25% (vs. non-smoking) respectively, whereas female gender, obesity, history of heart attack, diabetes, peptic ulcer and high blood pressure at baseline had a negative association of −85%, −25%, −16%, −37%, −22% and −24% respectively. Alcohol consumption changed over age with different trends among the studied subgroups and types of alcohol, suggesting targeted monitoring of alcohol consumption.

Alcohol Contribution to Total Energy Intake and Its Association with Nutritional Status and Diet Quality in Eight Latina American Countries

“…In regards to the latter, we found that there were more alcohol consumers in low SES irrespective of age, which also had the highest alcohol consumption in agreement with other studies [ 4 , 38 , 39 ]. The International Alcohol Study [ 40 ] demonstrated that drinkers below the poverty line across seven countries had a greater probability of being heavy drinkers, suggesting that the burden of heavier alcohol consumption is falling on people at the most vulnerable end of the socioeconomic spectrum.…”

Traditional lifestyle factors partly mediate the association of socioeconomic position with intrahepatic lipid content: The Maastricht study

“…This mediation was suppressive since alcohol intake was higher in individuals with a high SEP, which has also been observed in other studies. [33] , [34] , [35] Of note, the suppressive effect of alcohol was less pronounced in women, which may explain why all associations between the SEP indicators and IHL content were stronger in women. Moreover, the suppressive effect of alcohol was much stronger for the association of low income ( vs. high income) and IHL content, which may explain the non-significant relationship between income and IHL content.…”