As Americans Age Liquor Use Decreases

WASHINGTON — As Americans aged over the past two generations, they drank less alcohol. And the younger generation of adults drank less heavily than the ones before it, according to the first analysis of alcohol-consumption trends over adult life spans.

By the time they reached their 80s, more than 40 percent of men and 60 percent of women said they didn't drink at all, according to a study in the August issue of the American Journal of Medicine.

Over time, beer drinkers generally shifted to wine, the study found, and the younger generation drank less hard liquor than the older ones did. At the same time, more and more adults aged into moderate drinkers by federal dietary standards. They define moderate drinking as two drinks per day for men and one per day for women.

"They've understood that a little alcohol is OK but a lot is not good," said Curtis Ellison, a co-author of the report and a professor of medicine and public health at Boston University School of Medicine.

The Denver Post