The number of bingedrinking episodes per 100 drinking sessions was also reported and again Ireland is to the forefront with a figure of 30 per hundred. In the UK, this figure was 22, and in Italy 12.

However, fewer than 1% of Irish women between the ages of 18 and 64 drink every day, which tallies with most other countries in the EU.

Sleep your way slim
IF you're struggling to shift unwanted pounds, you might be advised to look to your sleeping patterns. Recent research from the University of Bristol is now providing even more evidence that lack of sleep and obesity are linked. Dr Shahrad Taheri, one of the scientists behind the research, believes that the body is hyper-aware of the states of sleep and wakefulness. When you're awake, the body believes you need to eat for energy whereas if you're asleep, you don't. Lack of sleep can also cause cortisol levels to rise, which promotes obesity. Unlike most diets, trying to get in eight hours' sleep sounds like a very pleasant route to weight-loss.

Doing the maths
THERE'S a relatively good awareness of the reading disorder dyslexia, but dyscalculia, the maths learning disability is not as well known. While people with dyscalculia have good language, science and creative arts skills and are competent at some aspects of maths, they have problems with number sequences, the passage of time and may be bad at handling money. Now scientists in the US and Britain have isolated a particular part of the brain that is used for counting. They tested brain activity in an area responsible for counting 'how many' and knowing 'how much'. Dr Brian Butterworth of UCL described the difference as firstly assessing how many men versus women are in a room by counting them as they enter the room, and then trying to assess the difference by looking at the room where everyone is present. Both methods should give the same result. However, it emerged that a different part of the brain was used to process 'how much', indicating that the arithmetic part of brain function is abnormal in people with dyscalculia.