HANOI, Nov. 11 (Xinhua) -- Vietnam saw an increase in the rates of alcoholic consumption among both men and women, said the country's General Department of Preventive Medicine under the Ministry of Health (MoH) on Friday.
According to the department at an MoH-held seminar in capital Hanoi on Friday, in the past five years from 2011-2015, the rate of alcoholic consumption among Vietnamese men aged 24-64 has risen from 69.6 percent to 80.3 percent.
Some 44.2 percent of Vietnamese alcoholic male users drank at hazardous level and 47.9 percent of them drove vehicles after having alcoholic drinks, reported Vietnam's state-run news agency VNA.
Meanwhile, the rate of alcoholic consumption among local women climbed from 5.6 percent to 11.2 during the 2011-2015 period, said the department, adding that Vietnam has become the country with the highest beer consumption among ASEAN countries and the third among Asian countries.
Other reports at the seminar showed that alcoholic drinks are the main cause for 30 percent of the social order disturbances and 33.7 percent of family violence cases in Vietnam.
Representatives at the seminar proposed the government to speed up the process of building a law on prevention and fight against harms of alcoholic drinks and urged the parliament to bring the law bill into law-building agenda in 2017.
