The survey covered 33,237 respondents aged 18-64, including 1,500 in Croatia, , who were interviewed from May 26 to June 14, 2015, the Croatian Public Health Institute, which conducted the survey in Croatia, has said.
The survey shows that 84.6% of respondents consumed alcohol over 12 months, of whom 88.5% were men and 80.7% were women. Croatia was among the countries with below average alcohol consumption, as 78.1% of respondents drank over 12 months, of whom 85.3% men and 71% women.
Although statistically Croatian men drank more alcohol than women, they were below the men's average in the countries surveyed.
Other countries with below average alcohol consumption were Spain, Portugal, Italy, Hungary and Romania, while Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Iceland, Great Britain, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland, Austria, France, Bulgaria and Greece were above average.
Sixty-nine percent of respondents drank beer, the Croatian average being 66.2% (65.2% of men and 51.3% of women); 57.9% of respondents drank hard drinks, including 45.4% in Croatia (54.9% of men and 362% of women).
In Croatia, 21.9% of respondents did not drink alcohol over 12 months, including 13.9% who had never consumed alcohol. Also, 11.1% of Croats drank excessively at least once a month, meaning ingesting 60 grams of pure alcohol at one time for men and 40 g for women. In terms of volume of pure alcohol consumed over 12 months, beer comes first with 56%, followed by wine (34%) and hard drinks (10%).
As for motives for drinking, 38.3% of Croatian respondents said "boozing" made parties better, 26.4% said it was fun, 25.2% said they liked the feeling, 17.7% said alcohol was part of a healthy diet, and 14.4% said it was healthy.
Croatia, Portugal and Romania showed the biggest differences between the sexes as Croatian men were five times likelier to have alcohol-related problems than women. Croatian women have markedly fewer alcohol-related problems in relation to the average of the countries surveyed.
As for harm caused by drunk persons, the survey shows that 20.1% of respondents suffered some kind of distress by unknown persons, 43.7% by persons known to them, and 49.8% by unknown and known persons, such as being kept awake at night, verbally abused, physically hurt, participating in a row, being driven by a drunk driver, being involved in a traffic accident, feeling unsafe in public, and being harassed by persons vomiting, urinating or causing a disturbance.