GREEN
BAY, Wisconsin. — As if a city best known for football and beer needs another excuse
to party. Well, bottoms up, Green Bay. You have another trophy to put in the case.
24/7 Wall St., a Delaware-based financial news and opinion
corporation, just rated Green Bay, Wisconsin, the drunkest city in America.
"The excessive drinking rate among adults in Green Bay
is the highest of any metro area in the country," according to a study
released Wednesday. The group analyzed self-reported data from Robert Wood
Johnson Foundation and the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute.
The data was collected across nearly 400 metro areas.
Green Bay's No. 1 ranking shows a two-spot jump from last
year's drunkest city list, surpassing former No. 1 Appleton, which fell to
third place.
The study notes Green Bay has 138 bars and more than 26% of
adult residents regularly drink to excess or binge drink — the national average
is 18%. Binge drinking is defined by the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention as men consuming five or more alcoholic drinks in less than two
hours, and women consuming four or more alcoholic drinks in less than two
hours.
The findings show a trend in Wisconsin overall, too. It's
the second year the state has beat out all other states for the most spots on
the list. Of the 20 drunkest cities in the country, 10 are Wisconsin cities:
Green Bay (No. 1), Eau Claire (No. 2), Appleton (No. 3), Madison (No. 4),
Oshkosh (No. 6), Wausau (No. 9), La Crosse (No. 10), Fond du Lac (No. 12),
Sheboygan (No. 15) and Milwaukee rounding out the top 20.
The study also found cities with heavy drinking tend to have
better-educated, higher earning and healthier populations than cities with the
lowest excessive drinking rates.
Some might argue being known as a drunk city is hardly
anything to celebrate — and in some respects, they'd be right.
The CDC reports binge drinkers are 14 times more likely to
be involved in alcohol-impaired driving. That in mind, Green Bay is one of only
five metro areas nationwide where more than half of all its deadly car crashes
involve alcohol.
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Article from USA Today
