NHS Alcohol Units - Dangerous Advice

The latest 'flyer' from the NHS once again gets the number of alcohol units in a 'glass' of wine or a pint of beer seriously wrong. The flyer that was posted through my front door last week gives the number of units as just ONE per glass. The small print tells you that they are referring to a 1.25ml glass, but even with an average alcohol by volume (abv) of 13, that would give 1.625 units per glass. Why not call it TWO units per glass?

Where on earth do you find wine with an abv of 11? I checked in Sainsbury's today and could not find a single bottle under 12 abv and most were 13.5 and a few 15. The NHS even shows a 50ml glass of wine on their units guide and suggests a ridiculously low .9 units. Why?

The NHS figures are all underestimates thereby giving a very false and, in my view, highly dangerous estimate of the number of units that people are probably consuming. Why not 'round up' the figures and give the potential maximum number of units?

Most alcoholics and alcohol abusers rarely drink wine from 1.25ml glasses or low strength beers. Pubs and restaurants tend to use 175ml and 250 ml glasses and call them medium or large. Nearly every beer drinker that calls ADMIT drinks beer with an abv of 5-6. A pint means you are consuming nearly 3 units of alcohol not the 2 suggested by the NHS. If you take a 250ml glass of wine you are likely to be drinking 3.25 units of alcohol with average strength wine and potentially 3.75 units of a 15 abv wine. That is nearly 4 times the NHS guidance. Three large glasses of wine would put you over the dink drive limit for around 5-6 hours and yet you might think you are safe if you follow the NHS guidelines.

Next time you ask for a large glass of wine in a restaurant or pub, ask to see the bottle and find out what size measure you are drinking - you will get a shock.

The abv divided by (1000ml divided by the glass or measure size) = Units of alcohol

e.g. Wine abv 13 divided by (1000ml divided by 250ml large glass or measure = 4) = 3.25 Units

or Wine abv 13 divided by (1000ml divided by 175ml medium glass or measure = 5.714) = 2.275 Units

or Wine abv 13 divided by (1000ml divided by 125ml very small glass or measure = 8) = 1.62 Units

Not one of these typical glasses is anywhere near ONE unit!

Is it safe to drive one hour after consuming one glass of wine or a pint of beer? The simple answer is a resounding NO. There are too many variables to come up with an accurate assessment of when you will reach the drink drive limit. Although most people tend to decrease their alcohol level by one unit per hour, heavy drinkers who consume more than 40 units per week (that is just 4 bottles of wine or 8 pints of beer per week) could easily only decrease by half a unit per hour. And no amount of coffee or a cold shower is going to speed up the process!