The binge time bomb

For the first time, women have overtaken men to become the worst binge drinkers in Europe, according to new research from King's College London.

More than a third of women in their twenties are binge drinkers (meaning they consume more than six units - a unit is a small glass of wine, a pub measure of spirits or a half pint of normal-strength beer or cider - in one session) and more than half exceed the weekly recommended maximum of 14 units.

The findings come just as the Department of Health finalises plans for a national strategy to reduce the toll exacted by alcohol abuse. Figures last year showed that drink - related problems, from crime to public disorder to lost productivity, cost the NHS £16 billion a year. Women, particularly those in their twenties and thirties, have been drinking more heavily in the past decade.

Men are allowed 21 units a week and the number of those exceeding this recommendation has remained constant, at around one in four. But the number of women exceeding the 14-units limit has risen to nearly one in six. The figure is higher still in the 16-24 age group.

What makes this so serious is that women can do more harm to themselves with alcohol than men. Even if a man and woman are the same height and weight, alcohol will affect them differently because women carry more fat than men, which increases the concentration of alcohol in other tissues.

Women also metabolise alcohol differently. An enzyme in the bowel wall breaks down a proportion of the alcohol we drink before it enters the bloodstream, and men have naturally higher levels of this enzyme.

So, if a similar-sized man and woman both knock back a double whisky, the woman will end up with significantly higher blood-alcohol level than the man.

Sadly, the statistics already reflect the underlying trends. Alcohol-related deaths in women have more than doubled since the early Nineties - and they are not just at risk from liver failure.

Too much alcohol can reduce fertility, damage developing babies and can even lead to breast cancer, of which there are around 50,000 extra cases in the UK over the past 20 years alone.