A new study suggests doctors should pay closer attention to these patients, who may be excessively drinking more than previously thought.
Researchers Say This Group Should Be Screened for Binge Drinking
Published on Jun. 16, 2025
It’s something we surely all know already: Excessive alcohol use can be dangerous. Over time, it can lead to liver, heart, and pancreas damage, as well as an increased risk of cancer, among other potential health issues, according to the Cleveland Clinic.
In two particularly sobering statistics, health experts estimate that 178,000 Americans die every year from excessive alcohol use—and 17% of the entire U.S. adult population reportedly engages in binge drinking, which is “four or more drinks (women) or five or more drinks (men) on an occasion.”
According to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), binge drinking is a “pattern of drinking alcohol that brings blood alcohol concentration (BAC) to 0.08%” or higher.
Now, a study published in the peer-reviewed medical journal JAMA in April has brought more attention to this concerning type of drinking, particularly in one segment of the population.
Representing the University of Pittsburgh, Harvard Medical School, Duke University, and other health-focused institutes, a team of seven U.S.-based researchers set out to learn more about “sex-based differences in binge and heavy drinking in recent years.” They hypothesized that “these differences would narrow among young and middle-aged adults.”
The team accessed data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), analyzing information for 267,843 adults 18 years or older from either 2017 to 2019 or 2021 to 2023.
Research indicated that, overall, women did not binge drink as much as men between the years 2017 and 2019. Similarly, it appeared that women also “had significantly lower past-month binge drinking levels than males overall” between 2021 and 2023.
However, data suggested that women between the ages of 18 and 25 had higher binge drinking levels than men.
The study authors wrote, “This analysis found that past-month binge drinking among young adult females in 2021-2023 was higher than males, reversing 2017-2019 patterns, whereas males in other age groups continued to binge and heavy drink at higher rates.”
The team suggested that this increase in binge drinking could be due to “more rapid decreases in binge drinking over time among young adult males relative to females, or to plateauing or increases in binge drinking among females.”
Pointing to potential alcohol-related health complications—namely “rising alcohol-related liver disease and mortality among females relative to males”—researchers suggested that doctors should “appropriately” screen young women for both binge drinking and heavy drinking.
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