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How Much Alcohol Is Too Much

By Diane Hanson

Sometimes in life, we go overboard with certain things we shouldn't, and alcohol happens to fall under this category. You may think that occasional binge drinking is alright. Unfortunately, it can be just as bad for your health as regular bingeing.

So, if you're going to party with alcohol over the weekends, it's wise know your alcohol limits – save yourself from the agony of hangovers, accidents and major health risks.

Alcohol affects different people in different ways, depending on factors like age, gender, race, physical health, family history, drinking patterns, and use of other drugs.

When alcohol passes through the digestive tract, it's dispersed in the body's water/fluid. The more water available, the more diluted the alcohol.

Since men generally weigh more than women, and pound for pound, women have less water in their bodies than men, and thus a woman’s brain and other organs are exposed to more alcohol before it's broken down.

It's recommended that women shouldn’t drink more than 2 units of alcohol a day and 14 in a week, and men should stick to 3 units a day and 21 a week. One unit of alcohol is 10 ml (1 cl) by volume, or 8 g by weight, of pure alcohol.

One unit of alcohol is about equal to:

half a pint of ordinary strength beer, lager or cider (3-4% alcohol by volume), or
a small pub measure (25ml) of spirits (40% alcohol by volume), or
a standard pub measure (50ml) of fortified wine such as sherry or port (20% alcohol by volume).

To find out how many units of alcohol are in a drink:

Multiply the volume (in milliliters) by %ABV then divide the result by 1000. ABV stands for Alcohol By Volume. All pre-packaged alcoholic drinks must state how strong they are. Strength is shown as a percentage, with the letters ABV after the number.

The more you drink above these limits, the greater your risk of developing serious health problems such as liver disease (cirrhosis or hepatitis), stomach and pancreas disorders, depression, anxiety, sexual difficulties, muscle and heart muscle disease, high blood pressure, damage to nervous tissue, some cancers, and obesity.

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how much alcohol is too much