500,000+ Middle Aged Female Alcoholics in Australia

[Dragon]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-02-11/b ... ls/6086378

More than 500,000 middle-aged Australian women are engaging in high-risk drinking and there is insufficient help available, researchers have warned.

Dubbed the "sandwich generation", researchers described a cohort of women aged 35 to 59 drowning under the pressures of teenage children, ageing parents, work responsibilities and demanding partners.

They were identified in a University of Western Sydney study which was the first to investigate the increase in middle-aged women drinking at problem levels.

Lead researcher Dr Janice Withnall said among those sandwich generation women there were those who had limited coping abilities or nowhere else to turn and took solace in alcohol.

For 16 per cent of these women, the drinking was high-risk leading to dependence.

This equated to 624,000 women aged between 35 and 59 struggling with risky drinking or alcohol problems.

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Keep in mind Australia's population is only 23 million...