KEY POINTS:
New drink-driving figures have confirmed that women are fast emerging as a problem group when it comes to alcohol.
Figures released last month which showed a blowout in the number of alcohol-related hospital admissions for women have now been matched by female drink-driving statistics.
Otago University researcher Geoff Hall, a specialist in transport law and sentencing, said the number of women caught drink-driving had increased by a massive 1700 per cent over the past 20 years.
He described the figure as "alarming" and said the Government was failing to target this rising problem group.
According to Professor Hall's research, 274 women nationally were caught drink-driving in 1986. By 2006, that number had increased 1700 per cent to 5016.
The increase for men in the same period was about 185 per cent, from 5786 to 16,450.
"This is a significant shift and no doubt reflects the changing role of women in New Zealand society," Prof Hall told the Otago Daily Times.
"Surprisingly, not one of the drink-driving ads targets females."
The findings were "dramatic" and education for women was needed that was both informative and used scare tactics, he said.
Police southern region roading manager Inspector Andrew Burns said police were also noticing a "worrying trend" towards more women drink-drivers.
That could be because more women were driving, and more were drinking, he said.
The percentage of women among all drink-drivers rose from 9 per cent of the total in 1986 to 23 per cent last year.
The two groups of women with the most significant increase were those aged over 40 (an 82 per cent increase) and those between 17 and 19 (144 per cent).
Land Transport New Zealand media manager Andy Knackstedt said although the drink-driving advertising campaign was skewed towards men, it was as applicable for women.
Drink-driving was still "overwhelmingly" a male problem and the focus needed to be on that.
LTNZ was aware the number of women drink-drivers was increasing, and a campaign targeting women that ran in 2002 could be revisited, he said.
Figures presented to the Alcohol Advisory Council last month showed a six-fold rise on previous calculations in alcohol-related youth admissions to Wellington Hospital.
Wellington Hospital emergency medicine specialist Paul Quigley said teenage females were dominating the figures and, if current rates continued, they would account for 60 per cent of all alcohol admissions under 20 by the end of the year.
"The common perception is that being smashed is a male-dominated activity, but we are now seeing more young women than men presenting with severe intoxication," he said.
- NZPA
