Dry January: What is it and why are so many hopping on the trend?

For those focused on health in the new year, a popular resolution is cutting back on alcohol through initiatives like Dry January.

Transcript

00:00Into dry January, what's become bigger and bigger certainly is more on my radar, I've

00:06got lots of friends who do it. In your experience, just how popular are these dry or even damp

00:12Jan trends? Have you seen an increase there and are they schemes you'd encourage people

00:16to get on board with?

00:17Yeah, they absolutely are. It's a great opportunity to rethink your relationship with alcohol.

00:23January people are often trying to save money as well, so it's doing more than one job.

00:28As per previously, there's still lots of other options out there if you want to continue

00:33to be going out and socialising and maybe drinking a zero alcohol product in place of

00:39the alcohol you might drink at another time of the year. But I think what we would say

00:42more widely is you should be thinking about and keeping an eye on the total number of

00:47units a week all year round, not just at Christmas or January, and keeping an eye on the 14 units

00:56guidelines set out by the Chief Medical Officer is really, really important. Have several

01:00days in the week where you don't drink at all and that keeps your health risks at that

01:05lower level, which is what we all want ultimately.

01:07Yeah, I suppose it's just when you get into bad habits, isn't it? Like if you just, you

01:11know, get into a routine of having a glass of wine with you dinner every night, it slowly

01:16creeps up on you, you don't realise how much you're having, I suppose.

01:20Exactly and there is a, what we would like to encourage is for people to just be thinking

01:23about it a bit more, checking how much you drink from time to time is really important.

01:27You can do a quick check on our website and that will tell you whether you're drinking

01:32at those lower risk levels, which is great news, or if you're perhaps drinking at an

01:36increasing risk level. Think about talking to your friends and family about what you're

01:41intending to do. Have a backup plan in mind so that if you are going somewhere, maybe

01:47take a zero alcohol product with you instead of a normal strength one. Perhaps keep a diary

01:55of what you're doing as well or download an app so that you can record what you've been

01:59doing.