Dry January: “France has a persistent problem with alcohol”

It's a sequence that has caused a lot of ink to flow. “You have become boring”: in April 2024, when the actor and humorist Artus declares, in the show What an era!that he stopped drinking alcohol, the reaction of journalist Léa Salamé is controversial.

So much so that faced with the deluge of criticism, the presenter had to put water in her wine and make her my fault on a typically “franchouillard” remark.

A “revealing episode”, regrets Mickael Naassila, addictologist and president of the French Society of Alcoholology. It was he who imported Dry January to France, a British initiative launched in 2013 to encourage our neighbors across the Channel to experience for themselves the benefits, for their health and well-being, of a one-month break in their alcohol consumption, with a “fun and non-moralistic” dimension, more effective than simple information on the risks.

A book titled I stop drinking without becoming boring

Since 2019, the alcohol-free month, Dry January – or January Challenge – has been established in the French landscape. Not without difficulty, because “France has a persistent problem with alcohol”, writes Professor Naassila in a guide entitled I stop drinking without becoming boring (Solar), to be released January 2, 2025.

In our society, alcohol is the norm. From the President of the Republic, who asked, in 2018, that we stop “annoying the French with this bullshit”, to the powerful wine lobby, which relies on an economic sector accounting for 600,000 jobs and which has everything made to minimize the effects of the Evin law, through a Dry January supported by associations, but not by public authorities, the country is resisting…

The “French Paradox”, “a heresy”

Mentalities and beliefs too. The idea of ​​a protective effect of wine on the good health of our heart and our coronary arteries, according to a study published in the journal The Lancet in 1992, remains alive and well.

“Fake news”, denounces Mickaël Naassila: the “French Paradox”, according to which although eating fat, the French are protected from cardiovascular diseases by their consumption of red wine, is “a heresy which contributes to normalizing the consumption of alcohol “.

In such a context, those who want to stop or limit “drinking”, even for just thirty days, have merit, still exposed to sarcasm and signs of incomprehension. This choice, especially if it goes beyond the experimentation of January, risks making them seem “boring”, for people who do not know how to enjoy life.

Faced with expectations and pressure from those around us, sobriety is a “social challenge”. However, trying it offers the opportunity to think about its consumption, even if it does not seem problematic and relates to alcohol use disorders (AUD).

Which drinker are you?

So, when do we drink too much? Why do we drink? What type of consumer are we?

In his work, Mickael Naassila described five profiles, other than that of the alcohol-dependent: the “occasional” drinker, who does not refuse a drink out of a need for integration, “social”, who drinks from colleagues and at evenings with friends, without going overboard, but with a bon vivant, “regular” side, who drinks almost every day without questioning this habit, “party animal”, that is to say “binge drinker” style (6 to 7 standard glasses of alcohol consumed in less than two hours), with episodes of excess. Are we finally “stressed” drinkers, who drink from time to time to decompress and calm our anxiety?

“A risk to his health”

In small or large doses, without necessarily being pathological, “alcohol is not insignificant”, recalls the researcher.

While the message of “moderation” gives us a clear conscience, this specialist, who heads the research group on alcohol and drug dependencies at Inserm, recalls that the latest scientific studies have demonstrated that “all alcohol consumption involves a risk to his health. And that it increases from one glass per day. Example: 28,000 new cases of cancer per year are attributable, in France, to alcohol consumption, which is also the leading preventable cause of breast cancer…

Without demonizing alcohol, this risk should therefore be known, and it remains limited “as long as the consumption of alcohol remains a pleasure and respects the benchmarks” (do not drink more than two glasses per day, abstain at minimum two days per week).

As for those who no longer drink at all, Mickaël Naassila calls for them to be respected in the same way as those who have stopped smoking and for their choice to be… trivialized.

Helene Pommier