Substance Use & Misuse, 48:1130–1137, 2013 Copyright C  2013 Informa Healthcare USA, Inc. ISSN: 1082-6084 print / 1532-2491 online DOI: 10.3109/10826084.2013.808464 ORIGINAL ARTICLE Do Religion and Religiosity Have Anything to Do With Alcohol Consumption Patterns? Evidence From Two Fish Landing Sites on Lake Victoria Uganda Nazarius M. Tumwesigye 1 , Lynn Atuyambe 1 , Simon P. S. Kibira 1 , Fred Wabwire-Mangen 1 , Florence Tushemerirwe 1 and Glenn J. Wagner 2 1 School of Public Health, Makerere University College of Health Sciences, Kampala, Uganda; 2 Rand Corporation, Santa Monica, USA Fish landing sites have high levels of harmful use of alcohol. This paper examines the role of religion and religiosity on alcohol consumption at two fish land- ing sites on Lake Victoria in Uganda. Questionnaires were administered to randomly selected people at the sites. Dependent variables included alcohol consump- tion during the previous 30 days, whereas the key independent variables were religion and religiosity. Bivariate and multivariate analysis techniques were applied. People reporting low religiosity were five times more likely to have consumed alcohol (95% confidence interval: 2.45–10.04) compared with those reporting low/average religiosity. Religion and religiosity are po- tential channels for controlling alcohol use. Keywords Religion, religiosity, isherfolk, alcohol consumption, harmful use of alcohol INTRODUCTION Uganda is rated among countries with high per capita al- cohol consumption in Africa and the world. In 2004, the country was rated highest in terms of per capita alcohol consumption (World Health Organization [WHO], 2004) at 19.4 L while in 2011 it was rated the 28th in the world (WHO, 2011) at 11.9 L. The country lies in East Africa with an area of 236,040 km 2 , with an estimated popula- tion of 35.9 million (Central Intelligence Agency [CIA], 2009). It became independent in 1962; its capital city is Kampala. According to the 2001 demographic health survey, 24% of women and 45% of men drank alcohol during 1 The journal’s style utilizes the category substance abuse as a diagnostic category. Substances are used or misused; living organisms are and can be abused. Editor’s note. The authors are grateful to both IDI and the SABRES project. The authors would also like to thank all study participants and Global Research Consult, Ltd. (GRC) that provided the data collection and data management staff. Address correspondence to Nazarius M. Tumwesigye, School of Public Health, Makerere University College of Health Sciences, P.O. Box 7072 Kampala, Uganda; E-mail: naz@musph.ac.ug. the previous 30 days, but what is worrying is that 25% of women and 51% of men who drank alcohol got drunk during the same period (Uganda Bureau of Statistics [UBOS] & ORC Macro, 2001). A seminationwide sur- vey in 2003 documented 40% of women and 55% of men drank alcohol in the previous 12 months, but 30% of the men drinkers drank ive or more times a week com- pared with only 13% in United Kingdom (Tumwesigye & Kasirye, 2009). In the same study, 57% of the men drinkers reported being “heavy drinkers” [>8,468 g on single day (Wilsnack, Wilsnack, Kristjanson, Vogeltanz- Holm, & Gmel, 2010] compared with 28% in United Kingdom. Uganda’s population is a God fearing one with 99.1% having a religious afiliation according to the 2002 census (Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Develop- ment [MOFPED], 2002). Large congregations gather for church or Muslim religious services weekly. Religion is central to most activities in the country. Many studies have established an inluence of religion and religiosity on al- cohol consumption patterns, but very little research has been done to examine this process and outcome in devel- oping countries. In this paper, religiosity refers to how of- ten one attends religious services apart from weddings and funerals. This paper assesses the relationship between alcohol consumption and participation in religious activities with the aim of establishing the inluence of religion and reli- giosity on alcohol consumption patterns. If this relation- ship exists and if it is a signiicant one, then religiosity can be considered to be an indicated potential intervention fo- cus and tool against alcohol abuse. 1 1130 Subst Use Misuse Downloaded from informahealthcare.com by 41.202.239.242 on 09/16/13 For personal use only.