Stop the presses! The U.S. is not falling down in a drunken stupor

Remember all that neo-Prohibitionist foolishness about increased pandemic drinking? The latest Gallup poll offers more evidence that the Drys were wrong

Fewer U.S. adults are drinking, and those who are are drinking less. That’s the finding from the most recent Gallup poll about alcohol use in the U.S. – and it directly contradicts every scare story, fear-mongering headline, and panic-stricken Internet alert that we’ve seen during the pandemic.

Gallup’s survey, generally regarded as the most accurate overview of U.S. alcohol consumption, found that 60 percent of U.S. adults reported drinking wine or beer in 2020 – down from 65 percent in 2019. In addition, our average weekly number of drinks fell to 3.6 from 4.0

So I guess we’re not all passed out on the couch, are we?

In fact, says Gallup, the number of Americans who drink may be at a 20-year low. As recently as 2010, two-thirds of us said we drank alcohol. And, says the study, the average number of weekly drinks is the lowest since 2001 ”and is more in line with reported alcohol consumption in the late 1990s and early 2000s than with more recent readings.”

In other words, almost every single story warning about pandemic drinking, including the scare piece in my beloved New York Times, may have been wrong. Or, as one analyst told me when I wrote about pandemic drinking earlier this year, it would have been almost impossible for us to drink more, given that bars and restaurants were closed for the first part of 2020 and that hardly anyone went to a party.

Once again, this is not to discount the horrors of alcoholism or to infer that’s it’s OK to drink to excess. As noted here many times, I know the ruin alcoholism produces. Rather, it’s to remind everyone that drinking is not cigarette smoking, and that wine with dinner does not lead to death, ruin, and destruction like some 21^st century version of “Reefer Madness.”

More about the Neo-Prohibitionists and drinking
• Binge drinking during the pandemic — or not
• Has wine with dinner been turned into binge drinking?
• Are the neo-Prohibitionists winning the debate about drinking?