Each year we spend some €3.5 billion on alcohol, equivalent to the total amount spent on the health service. We are now ranked second in the European alcohol consumption league. Between 1989 and 2000, a period in which consumption of alcohol in other countries was declining, consumption here rose by more than 50%. That is hard to believe. Some 60% of young women and 50% of young men drink dangerously and there is a strong connection between alcohol and suicide.