Portugal’s Drinking Surge Defies EU Trend, Pressuring Health and Safety

Portugal’s drinkers are swimming against a continental tide. While most of the European Union has quietly cut back over the past decade, Portuguese consumers have added extra rounds, lifting the nation into the small group of countries where alcohol use is rising instead of falling. The pattern matters well beyond lifestyle: it is reshaping public-health budgets, road-safety rules and even the way Portuguese wine is marketed abroad.

Continental Trend and the Portuguese Exception

Across the bloc the European average of 11.4 L of pure alcohol per adult per year has inched downward since 2013, helped by higher taxes, stricter advertising codes and a post-pandemic wellness boom. Belgium and Lithuania posted the steepest drops, shaving off more than 2.5 L per capita. Yet Portugal, Spain and Romania moved in the opposite direction, each adding around two litres per person to their yearly tally. In 2023 Eurostat still put the overall EU figure at 9.8 L, but the trio of outliers stood near or above 11.5 L. Public-health researchers at the WHO European office warn that Europe remains the world’s heaviest-drinking region despite the modest progress, and that the Portuguese upturn is erasing earlier gains recorded between 2005 and 2012.

Portugal’s Numbers Behind the Headline

Domestically, the detail is even starker. National health authority SICAD calculates that the Portuguese drank 12.1 L of pure alcohol in 2019, up from 11.5 L four years earlier, and provisional data for 2025 suggest a further nudge to 11.9 L. Eurostat’s lifestyle survey adds another layer: 21 % of adults here say they consume alcohol every single day, the highest share in the Union. Wine is the main driver. With roughly 62 L of wine per capita, Portugal outpaces Italy and France and accounts for nearly half of the EU’s total wine volume. At the same time, the age of first drink has slipped to 16, and heavy episodic drinking among 18-year-olds—often called binge drinking—touches 51 % in annual self-reports. Specialists note emergent gender dynamics too; the latest SICAD bulletin records a sharper rise among women, particularly in social settings once dominated by men.

Sociocultural Drivers Keeping Glasses Full

Why has Portugal uncorked more bottles while neighbours lock the cabinet? Analysts cite a weave of post-crisis optimism, aggressive beverage marketing, the festival economy that flourished after austerity, and the lingering effects of COVID-19 home consumption, when supermarket spirits sales surged. Wineries and craft-beer brands shifted their messaging toward lifestyle and empowerment, especially targeting millennial women. Simultaneously, cheap on-trade prices—Portugal’s average bar measure of wine still costs under €2 in much of the country—reinforce the habit. Public-perception studies reveal a paradox: Portuguese respondents recognise the health risk of daily drinking more readily than most Europeans, yet the social cost of refusing a glass at family gatherings or corporate dinners remains high. Add a tourism boom that encourages all-day terrace culture, and the stage is set for higher overall availability.

A Look Across the Border and Beyond

Spain offers a cautionary twin narrative. It shares Portugal’s Mediterranean diet and botellón street parties, but its latest Edades 2024 survey shows a slight decline in teenage intoxication even as adult daily use holds at 13 %. Public-health economists attribute the divergence to Spain’s tougher road-safety enforcement and an earlier decision to slash the drink-drive limit for novice motorists. In Romania, by contrast, a historic fondness for strong homemade spirits plus lax retail controls push average intake to an estimated 12.7 L. The country also tops the EU league for binge-drinking prevalence, and a 2024 forecast by the OECD projects a climb to 17 L unless curbs tighten. These comparisons matter for Lisbon because the Commission increasingly links cohesion-fund allocations to progress on non-communicable disease targets.

Can Policy Catch Up?

Portugal’s current template, the PNRCAD 2030 plan, echoes the WHO “best buys”—raise prices, limit marketing and cut availability. Yet enforcement remains patchy. The legal blood-alcohol limit of 0.5 g/L is generous by European standards; Spain is on track to reduce its ceiling to 0.2 g/L for everyone, mirroring the Irish model. Meanwhile municipal bylaws, from Porto’s nightlife-zone curfews to Vila Velha de Ródão’s recent workplace rules, illustrate a turn toward local experimentation. Fiscal levers have barely moved: excise duty on wine, politically sensitive in a major producing nation, is still zero. Health-sector voices, including the Order of Doctors and the Portuguese Liver Association, now call for a minimum-unit-pricing scheme akin to the Scottish system, estimating it could prevent 400 premature deaths annually.

What Stakes for Portuguese Society

The economic argument is gaining traction. A 2023 study by Católica Lisbon School pegged alcohol’s direct cost to the national health service at €1.4 B, equal to Portugal’s yearly public-housing budget. Road fatalities where alcohol is a factor have stopped falling and hover near 30 % of total deaths on motorways. The Ministry of Education worries about lost productivity too; absenteeism linked to drinking already subtracts €2.3 B from GDP each year. With Brussels preparing a fresh EU alcohol strategy for 2026, Lisbon faces a choice: stay an outlier or ride the continental momentum. Public-opinion polls suggest voters are split, cherishing the cultural role of vinho yet increasingly aware that the bill, both human and financial, keeps climbing.