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London (pte016/22.04.2005/10:30) - The amount of alcohol drunk by young women will surge over the next five years, according to research. As the BBC http://www.bbc.co.uk reports, market analyst Datamonitor http://www.datamonitor.com looked at consumer surveys in Europe and found that UK women aged 18 to 24 drank the most. It predicts that they will be drinking 291 litres a year by 2009 - the equivalent of about three large glasses of wine a day - up from 216 litres in 2004. This would mean that alcohol consumption among young women had doubled in a decade and they would be drinking more than men.
Previous studies have shown that the rate of female drinking is increasing more quickly than men with female teenagers already outstripping boys. Datamonitor used information from consumer surveys across Europe to work out how much people were drinking. It then looked at historical trends and expected lifestyle changes to work out how much women would be consuming in 2009. The UK came top out of seven western European countries - France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and Sweden. Germany had the second highest rates with women drinking 200 litres a year. Italian women drank the least - 66 litres. The average was 135 litres.
"Young women are having more independence than previously, higher levels of disposable income and there is a growing acceptance for women to consume alcohol," said Danielle Rebelo, the report's author. According to Martin Plant, of the University of West England, the prediction was "staggering" but he admitted that it could happen. "We know women are drinking more. Marketing strategies are targeting them more, and they have more social time and traditional social attitudes to female drinking are changing. It is a problem across Europe but the UK certainly has some of the highest rates," he added.
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