Maybe you have heard someone say you can still drive after one or two drinks. This may be true. However, before you hit the road, there are a few things you should know.
For one thing, the amount of alcohol differs greatly from one form to the next. Wine has more alcoholic content than most beer, for instance, and hard alcohol — like vodka — has much more than wine.
Therefore, “one or two drinks” can look very different depending on what you are drinking. According to the National Institutes of Health, a single standard drink is 14 grams of alcohol. That’s only 0.6 fluid ounces.
Granted, you never drink pure alcohol. Even a high-concentration drink like straight gin is likely around 40 percent alcohol, meaning the majority of your gin is not alcohol.
Even so, a standard drink of hard alcohol is just 1.5 ounces. That’s about one shot. It won’t even cover the ice cubes in the bottom of a glass.
A standard glass of wine is just 5 ounces. Most wine glasses will hold far more, but pouring 12 ounces into the cup just means you’re consuming nearly 2.5 “drinks.” Using the cup itself as a guide is deceptive.
The easiest alcohol to track is beer. If it’s a standard beer with about 5 percent alcohol, one drink is one 12-ounce can. However, even beer can get confusing. A pint-sized can is 16 ounces, or more than one drink. A craft beer that is 10 percent alcohol is two drinks.
If you lose track and accidentally wind up facing drunk driving charges, make sure you know what legal options you have.
Source: Gizmodo, “Do Different Kinds Of Alcohol Get You Different Kinds Of Drunk?,” Robbie Gonzalez, accessed May 22, 2018
