[Do the Japanese drink less alcohol than other peoples?: the finding from INTERMAP]

It has been pointed out that Japanese men drink more than American and British men. In this presentation, we report the comparison of drinking habits from the findings of the International Study of Macro-nutrients and Blood Pressure (INTERMAP) conducted during 1997-99 in Japan, China, the United States of America (U.S.), and the United Kingdom (U.K.). INTERMAP was conducted with highly standardized procedures including dietary assessment, blood pressure measurement and questionnaires to clarify and compare their relationship in randomly selected 4680 men and women aged 40-59 years from 17 centers in the four countries. For alcohol drinking habits, four times of 24-hour dietary recall studies and two times of one-week recall studies were conducted. The drinking prevalence of Japanese men was the highest among the four countries. For women, it was also higher than in U.S. but lower than in U.K. Abstinence rates in U.S. were extremely higher than those of Japanese (19, 20% vs. 1, 4% in men and women, U.S. vs. Japan, respectively). Japanese men consumed the average of 27 g per day of alcohol and it was the highest among the populations. Energy intake from alcohol per total energy intake was also the highest in Japanese men. Health professionals in Japan need to recognize from the findings of INTERMAP and other studies such as INTERSALT that Japanese men drink more alcohol than Americans and British counterparts.