England has 'worst child drinking problem in the world', with teen girls more likely than boys to get drunk
25 April 2024, 06:04
Children in England drink alcohol more than in any other country, a landmark report has suggested.
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Children aged 11 and 13 in England are the most likely to have ever drunk alcohol, according to a World Health Organisation (WHO) study.
The study asked questions of 280,00 children aged 11, 13 and 15 in 44 countries about their use of alcohol, cigarettes and vapes.
Some 34% of girls and 35% of boys said they have drunk alcohol by the age of 11, the highest level of any country.
By 13, some 57% of girls and 50% of boys in England had drunk alcohol - again topping the global chart.
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By 15, 53% of girls in England have drunk alcohol in the previous 30 days, compared with 39% of boys.
Alcohol use is higher among richer families: some 55% of girls and 56% of boys in England from higher income families say they have drunk alcohol in their lifetime. The figures for lower income households are 50% of girls and 39% of boys.
Meanwhile the UK seems to have more of an issue with under-age vaping than many other countries, with girls more likely to have used a vape by the age of 15 than the average for all 44 countries in the study.
Overall, girls aged 13 and 15 in the UK tend to be drinking, smoking and vaping more than boys.
Dr Jo Inchley, international co-ordinator for the study, called Health Behaviour In School-Aged Children, and from the University of Glasgow, suggested some of the UK data is concerning.
She told the PA news agency: "Vaping in the UK is higher than the average across all the countries that took part in the survey as a whole.
"I guess that's a little bit concerning, and we've certainly seen quite marked increases in vaping in Scotland over the last four years... lifetime use of e-cigarettes has more than doubled in Scotland since 2018.
"So there's two areas for concern. One is that our levels are higher than elsewhere in Europe and, secondly, it looks like the trends are worsening quite substantially over a relatively short period of time in the UK."
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Dr Inchley said one driver of increasing vape use may be their availability and low cost.
"Disposable vapes seem to be fairly readily accessible to young people and schools are reporting that that's a major issue that they're having to deal with on a day-to-day basis. Young people are telling us that too.
"Having ready access to any kind of substance like that obviously makes it more attractive and available, so that is a big issue.
"Some of the policy responses we're seeing now from Governments across the UK is really positive in that respect, because we do need to address the issue of availability and accessibility."
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She said there have been declines in the proportion of children who say they have ever used cannabis, certainly in Scotland in recent years.
But she added: "We don't see the same trends for what we call current use, or use of cannabis in last 30 days.
"We're not seeing the declines amongst regular users like we do amongst more experimental users.
"Compared with other countries, we're still relatively high. and 15-year-old boys in Scotland have the highest levels of cannabis use across the study as a whole.
"That's concerning. So, even though we've seen these decreases, we are still relatively high compared to other countries."
Dr Inchley said it is also "really quite worrying" that "England is at the top of the charts for 11 and 13-year-olds when it comes to alcohol use".
"So we're seeing really high levels of early initiation into drinking amongst boys and girls in England," she said.
"Why that's much higher than other countries, I don't really know, but it's certainly something we need to look at and address."
She added: "The big concerns are around vaping, but also there's some evidence that alcohol use might be going up again, amongst girls in England in particular.
"And we're seeing that across some other European countries as well.
"So that's quite interesting to explore as well, particularly, I think, in terms of Covid and post-Covid recovery and the impact that Covid has had on particularly that sort of age group."
