Nearly 25% of those over 15 years old in Hungary are alcoholics.

Hungary comes ahead of a line of nations reputed to be heavy drinkers, such as the British, Irish, Germans, Italians and French, and even slightly ahead of the second-placed Russians, website Qubit observes.

In a breakdown according to gender the Hungarian results are even more conspicuous: more than one-third of Hungarian men, 36.9%, are alcoholics, as against 7.2% of women.

Although Hungary has the highest number of alcoholics per capita, Hungarians do not drink the most alcohol per capita.

While in Hungary the average person drinks about 11 litres of pure alcohol per capita annually, the figures are 14.2 litres for list leader the Czech Republic, 13.2 litres in Latvia, 12.85 in Moldova, and 12.8 in Germany.

Hungary is not even in the top ten on the list of per capita consumption.

The preferred alcoholic drink for Hungarians in general and men in particular is beer, whereas most women prefer wine.

According to a Hungarian survey, most people in the 18-to-64-year age group drink beer in the largest quantity, followed by wine.

Spirits are almost as popular as wine, but is consumed in lesser quantities.