Hangover cures in Japan

By Ken Y-N ( April 14, 2006 at 23:38) · Filed under Lifestyle, Polls, Rankings

In January, DIMSDRIVE Research interviewed by means of an internet-based questionnaire 1,454 people, 59.2% male, to find out what people do to get rid of a hangover. The Japanese for hangover is 二日酔い, futsukayoi, “two days drunk”, which I think is a wonderfully descriptive term!

I find the whole subject of Japan and drink fascinating, and whilst I’m still to find the one survey that confirms my suspicion that whilst overall alcohol consumption in Japan may be lower than in the West, there are comparable, if not higher, figures for regular drinkers, and more worryingly, regular heavy drinkers. Alcohol abuse is still not recognised here as a societal problem; I’m not some sort of Puritan calling for prohibition, of course, just someone who wishes booze was taken seriously.

As a small anecdote, in one of our company magazines we got a depression checklist, and one of the signs was not wishing to join in with office drinking sessions; for me, these events cause me stress, and paying 4,000 to 5,000 yen to sit in a usually very smokey pub for two hours as people continute to talk shop all around whilst making do with a veggie option that is a poor excuse for a meal is not really my idea of fun; I’d rather be snuggling up with wifey under the kotatsu watching the telly at home!

Q: When you have a hangover, what do you often do to get rid of it? (Sample size=1,454, multiple answer)

Rank Method Votes
1 Drink water 264
2 Get a good sleep 180
3 Take stomach medicine, painkillers, etc 101
4 Have a bath 60
5 Drink miso soup (shijimi clam flavour, etc) 50
6 Take sports (isotonic) drink 35
7 Just grin and bear it 28
8 Take ukon (turmeric) 25
9 Drink tea 24
10= Drink coffee 17
10= Vomit 17

The trusty British standby of drinking coffee features only in tenth, and the other fallback, the hair of the dog (or just staying drunk…), appears nowhere.

Looking at the detailed breakdown, over four times more men just sit out their hangovers; calling Ralph and Hughie on the great white telephone was more popular with women in their twenties and men in their thirties than other age groups.

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    • 5 Comments »

    1. tom said,

      April 19, 2006 @ 19:23

      I’m reading this at work, suffering with a terrible hangover, so being at home under a duvet sounds very appealing.

      Do you know if there’s any truth in the idea I’ve heard a few times that a proportion of Japanese people have a genetic abnormality which makes them very succeptible to getting ill drinking?

    2. Ken Y-N (Seron) said,

      April 20, 2006 @ 00:15

      Yes, I believe that about 50% or more of the Japanese population are missing an enzyme that breaks down alcohol.

      Oh. I searched Google and found this in Science Week that says:

      Ethanol is readily absorbed from the gastrointestinal tract, and more than 90 percent is metabolized by the liver through oxidative mechanism involving mainly the enzyme alcohol dehydrogenase and certain other enzymes. Alcohol cannot be stored and all of it is metabolized. Alcohol dehydrogenase oxidizes alcohol to acetaldehyde. Apparently, approximately 85 percent of the Japanese population has an atypical alcohol dehydrogenase that operates about 5 times faster than the same enzyme does in non-Japanese. Other Asian groups may exhibit the same phenomenon. Consumption of alcohol by such persons leads to the accumulation of acetaldehyde, resulting in extensive vasodilation, facial flushing, and compensatory tachycardia (rapid heartbeat greater than 100 per minute).

      However, Wikipedia (but given what I say about Wikipedia in other places…) says:

      Many east Asians (e.g. about half of Japanese) have impaired acetaldehyde dehydrogenase; this causes acetaldehyde levels to peak higher, producing more severe hangovers and other effects such as flushing and tachycardia.

      (My bolding to highlight)

    3. Fantastic Japanese Booze Statistics « Gaijin Tonic said,

      December 19, 2007 @ 21:37

      […] Drinking water is the most popular hangover cure in Japan. […]

    4. Japanese Hangover Cures « Gaijin Tonic said,

      March 27, 2008 @ 16:53

      […] website What Japan Thinks conducted a survey of Japanese people to find their preferred hangover cures. The internationally […]

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