More women than ever are matching men's drinking habits in Northern Ireland, a new report revealed today.
While the numbers smoking has declined substantially, the levels of alcohol intake among both sexes has risen significantly over the last two decades.
According to Department of Health statistics, the proportion of men drinking between 1986 and 2002 rose from 73 per cent to 81 per cent.
But the increase in the numbers of women drinking was more striking, up 14 per cent to 73 per cent.
The Department claimed the new levels may have implications for the future health of women.
Women from a manual socio-economic background were significantly more likely to be lifetime abstainers than those from a non-manual background, the report said.
Despite there being far fewer smokers, the decline has been significantly less marked amongst women and by 2002 a similar proportion of women and men were smoking.
In 1986, 35 per cent of men and 32 per cent of women, aged over 16, smoked, but two years ago the numbers had dropped to 27 per cent and 26 per cent respectively.
The report said: "Although smoking is generally more common among men than women, men - especially younger cohorts - are also more likely to give up than women and their relative improvement in mortality from smoking-related diseases is higher."
In 2002, men in semi-skilled manual occupations were twice as likely to smoke than professional men (33 per cent versus 17 per cent), the report said.
Similarly, women in semi-skilled or unskilled manual occupations were three times as likely to smoke as professional women.
More women from manual backgrounds smoked than any other group by 2002.
PA