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More Danes choosing alcohol-free beer

TheCopenhagenPost
December 19th, 2017


This article is more than 7 years old.

Sales of alcohol-free beer jump significantly in a year

More varieties of non-alcoholic beers are available in Denmark (photo: Paul Josephs)

Beer-loving Danes are starting to develop a taste for alcohol-free beer. Sales of alcohol free beer have risen significantly over the past year according to the brewery association Bryggeriforeningen. In the past year, sales of non-alcoholic beer have increased by 19 percent to over 9 million cans and bottles. Over a three year period, there has been a threefold increase in sales.

More Danes, especially those planning on driving, are becoming aware of the brews, which, by law, may contain up to 0.5 percent alcohol.

One of the reasons cited for the increase is that the Danish breweries now offer consumers more non-alcoholic beers to choose from, and that the brewers have become better at making them taste better, or so says Bryggeriforeningen.

More choices
Three years ago, there were only a few Danish beers without alcohol on the shelves, where now there are 14 Danish beers with between 0.0 percent and 0.5 percent alcohol.

“An increasing number of consumers are living healthier and active lifestyles, and non-alcoholic beer fits well with the trend,” said Bryggeriforeningen director Niels Hald.

Hald said that even more alcohol-free varieties are on their way is coming from in 2018.

Parents with children are major purchasers of non-alcoholic beers, and safe driving council Hos Rådet for Sikker Trafik said that more hosts are serving non-alcoholic beer to guests that plan to drive. Drink driving is a contributing factor to every six traffic deaths in Denmark.


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A survey carried out by Megafon for TV2 has found that 71 percent of parents have handed over children to daycare in spite of them being sick.

Moreover, 21 percent of those surveyed admitted to medicating their kids with paracetamol, such as Panodil, before sending them to school.

The FOLA parents’ organisation is shocked by the findings.

“I think it is absolutely crazy. It simply cannot be that a child goes to school sick and plays with lots of other children. Then we are faced with the fact that they will infect the whole institution,” said FOLA chair Signe Nielsen.

Pill pushers
At the Børnehuset daycare institution in Silkeborg a meeting was called where parents were implored not to bring their sick children to school.

At Børnehuset there are fears that parents prefer to pack their kids off with a pill without informing teachers.

“We occasionally have children who that they have had a pill for breakfast,” said headteacher Susanne Bødker. “You might think that it is a Panodil more than a vitamin pill, if it is a child who has just been sick, for example.”

Parents sick and tired
Parents, when confronted, often cite pressure at work as a reason for not being able to stay at home with their children.

Many declare that they simply cannot take another day off, as they are afraid of being fired.

Allan Randrup Thomsen, a professor of virology at KU, has heavily criticised the parents’ actions, describing the current situation as a “vicious circle”.

“It promotes the spread of viruses, and it adds momentum to a cycle where parents are pressured by high levels of sick-leave. If they then choose to send the children to daycare while they are still recovering, they keep the epidemic going in daycares, and this in turn puts a greater burden on the parents.”