British drinkers underestimate how much they actually put away and the gap between what they think they drink and what they actually do drink could be as much as an average of a bottle of wine a week. Researchers from Liverpool John Moores University looked at what people said they drank - based on figures from the General Household Survey, carried out by the Office for National Statistics - and compared this to figures for alcohol sales. They found that people often didn't count special occasions such as weddings, birthdays and Christmas parties and, of course, the more they drank the harder it was to remember their consumption. The average Briton, they estimated, drinks around 26 units of alcohol a week compared to the Government's recommendation of 21 units for men and 14 for women. Official figures show that alcohol-related hospital admissions are approaching 1 million a year, a rise of 47% in the last five years.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/6833617/Drinkers-underestimate-alcohol-consumption-by-a-bottle-a-week.html