Alcohol Quick Facts

Alcohol use among adults in Minnesota

In 2023, most adult Minnesotans (58.4%) said they drink alcohol.

• 61.4% of men 18 and older reported alcohol use.
• 55.5% of women 18 and older reported alcohol use.

Excessive drinking

Excessive alcohol use can result in harms such as motor vehicle injuries, violence, heart disease, cancer, alcohol poisoning, and poor birth outcomes. Excessive drinking includes binge drinking (four or more drinks on one occasion for women, five or more drinks for men), heavy drinking (eight or more drinks in a week for women, 15 or more drinks in a week for men), and any drinking by pregnant women or people under age 21.

• Minnesota had one of the highest binge drinking rates in the nation in 2023, with 17% of adults reporting binge drinking.
• The percent of adults who said they binge drank in the past month has not changed much since 2011, with more men (20.4%) saying they binge drink than women (138%).
• Women and men ages 18 to 44 years (20.8% and 26.5% respectively) were more likely to say they binge drink than those older than 44 years (8.3% of women and 15.1% of men). However, the proportion of women reporting binge drinking increased over time.

If you are concerned about your drinking or the drinking of someone else, please talk with your doctor or health care provider.

Youth alcohol use

While alcohol use among adults in Minnesota has not changed much over the past seven years, youth alcohol drinking has declined.

• 9.2% of 9th and 11th grade students said they have used alcohol within the last 30 days in 2022, down from 21% in 2013.
• 3.5% of 9th and 11th grade students said they binge drink (drank four or more drinks on an occasion for females and five or more drinks for males).

Youth who use alcohol at a young age are more likely to experience alcohol dependence or abuse alcohol later in life than people who begin drinking at or after age 21.

Alcohol-related harms

Alcohol is used more often and by more people than any other drug, and contributes to more deaths, injuries, and illnesses than any other drug.

Alcohol-related mortality

The estimated number of alcohol-related deaths has increased over the past 18 years. These deaths include fully alcohol-attributable deaths such as alcohol poisoning and alcoholic liver disease, as well as partially alcohol-attributable deaths such as motor vehicle crashes and several types of cancer.

• There were an estimated 2,844 alcohol-related deaths each year between 2020 and 2021, compared to 2,151 alcohol-related deaths each year during 2015 to 2019.
• Men are more likely to die from alcohol-related causes than women. From 2020 to 2021, 66% of alcohol-related deaths were among men.
• Deaths caused directly by alcohol use increased significantly over the past 20 years.
• Fully alcohol-attributable deaths increased by 223% between 2000 and 2023.

The rate of alcohol-attributable deaths increases with age, with the largest increase over time seen among those 50 years and older primarily due to chronic causes of death.

Hospital treatment for alcohol-related conditions

The number of alcohol-related diseases and injuries requiring hospital treatment has increased over the past 20 years.

• In 2023, alcohol led to 26,082 inpatient hospitalizations and 32,879 emergency room visits for fully alcohol-attributable conditions.
• About 9% of all inpatient hospitalizations in Minnesota were for alcohol-attributable conditions.

Additional resources

• Preliminary: Fully Alcohol-Attributable Deaths in Minnesota, 2000-2020 (PDF)
• Alcohol Use among Minnesota Youth (PDF) data brief.
• CDC Alcohol Use
• NIH’s Alcohol and Your Health resources

For more information

Contact Kari Gloppen at Kari.Gloppen@state.mn.us or Kathleen Dubberley at Kathleen.Dubberley@state.mn.us for alcohol-related data or policy information.