Dr John Ryan

So really trying to focus on trying to get people to become abstinent and get alcohol out of their day to day is really important.

However, that may be, you know, and then people who are kind of drinking at risk levels where you think, OK, they're going to develop problems in the future.

It's about really getting them to

break the habits.

Things like COVID were a disaster for habits and trying to break that habit and trying to get them back to kind of having many, many days in the week where they don't drink alcohol and trying to limit the amount that they drink when they do drink.

So there's a lot of that.

Well, I think it's how you interpret it.

I think the way they're saying is that maybe it's over if they look at long term outcomes.

But I have no doubt, my clinical experience and data we have from our own hospital, it shows that really women are much more vulnerable to alcohol harms in the acute settings.

So say, for example, during COVID, 30% of people drank more than they would normally have drank.

And the people who ended up in ICU and critical care, people who ended up in the emergency department would generally have been men as the higher proportion, 60, 70%.

And that flipped during that time.

And it really just showed to having much more women as a proportion.

And that really just shows that women are more vulnerable.

So I think to the acute, you know, intoxication, toxicity from alcohol, there's no doubt that women are more vulnerable, but maybe over a long period of time and health related outcomes, that's what they're seeing.

It kind of balances out.

And in the UK, you know, the guidelines are same for men and women as low risk guidelines.

So maybe that's what it reflects.

I can't underestimate this.

We did our own studies here in Dublin and one in five people presenting to the emergency department are there for an alcohol related problem or harm from alcohol.