If your answer is “a glass of wine, maybe a beer”, and you have a British accent, you’re lying out of your butt-chugging ass:
Boniface and Nicola Shelton, both with the University College London’s Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, derived their figures by comparing self-reported data in a public health survey accounting for 14,041 people aged 16 and up to alcohol sales figures kept by British tax authorities.
The gap was huge. More than 20 percent of Britons’ annual wine consumption — or 2.6 million hectoliters (69 million gallons) — was unaccounted for. Nearly half of Britons’ beer consumption — 45 million hectoliters (1.2 billion gallons) — was unclaimed. And Britons seemed particularly reluctant to take credit for gulping down whiskey, vodka, tequila and gin. Nearly 60 percent of Britain’s spirit consumption remained unreported.
Bonerface seems to have stumbled upon an interesting phenomenon here.
Officer: Have you had anything to drink tonight?
Driver: *hic* erm…no…have YOU had anything to drink tonight, ossifer? *glazes over*
