Since Europeans first came to Australia, the country's relationship with alcohol has been a long and complex one.
The COVID-19 pandemic has added an extra layer of complexity.
Researchers from the University of New South Wales have looked at how the pandemic affected alcohol consumption, and purchasing in NSW before, during and after the NSW lockdown.
Professor Alison Ritter is the Director of the Drug Policy Modelling Program at the UNSW and one of the authors of the study.
She says some of the results are surprising.
"We thought that lots more people were drinking a lot more under lockdown. That is not what we found. We found that two out of three people had decreased their drinking or were not drinking anymore than they were before lockdown. So people are looking after themselves, they are resilient, they are showing self care, quite a few people stopped drinking all together under lockdown. We were not expecting that because they story has been so far that everyone has been drinking heaps."
