Young people are drinking less than previous generations with Gen Z increasingly opting to break with Britain's notorious drinking culture.
Among these is Charlie Martina who developed a drinking problem during her undergrad years at the University of Liverpool. Drinking masked Charlie's nerves, turning her from a "shy and anxious" person to someone "cool and interesting". She said the drinking culture in the UK meant she never questioned whether using alcohol to cope with mental illness could be a problem.
That got worse at university, where nights out, pub crawls and drinking games are a big part of student life. Many society socials revolve around alcohol and drinking is how Charlie met most of her friends. She said: "It was just a really big part of my life.
READ MORE: Daniel Radcliffe and other celebrities who have stayed sober
"I've always struggled with my mental health. When I was drinking, it was really hard to tell what was my mental health problems and what was a drinking problem. I wouldn't have called it a drinking problem at first, but it's a vicious cycle. My mental health would be really bad, so I would drink, and then because I drank, my mental health would be worse, and it just carried on like that."
Eventually she snapped out of it but going sober meant building her confidence up from scratch and learning how to make new friends during her Philosophy MA at the university without the help of booze. Charlie wanted to create a space where she and other sober students could make friends, so she set up the Sober Society.
Sitting at a freshers fair stall as hungover students laughed at the idea, she worried no one would join. The society now has roughly 300 members. Charlie said: "I really didn't expect it, but I think things are changing slowly.
Although drinking culture still is a really big thing among students, it's been really nice to have a safe space where we can just hang out and get to know each other and sort of get deep without having to drink, because I think when you make those bonds with people, you often are drinking."
For 18-year-old Othman Ibrahim, making friends while sober is nothing new because he's never had alcohol. Growing up in Saudi Arabia, where it is strictly prohibited, dabbling in drinking wasn't something he did as a teen. Now a first year architectural engineering student at the University of Liverpool, he finds people respectful, tolerant and inclusive of his sobriety.
But socialising can be a challenge sometimes. Othman said: "It is hard in the sense that, on the weekends when it is actually time to go out, it's really hard to hang out with my English friends because the only thing they want to do is go out and drink or go to clubs, which I don't feel comfortable doing since I don't drink."
Instead he hangs out with other people who don't drink or are from similar backgrounds, or he stays with his friends who drink until they get drunk enough for him to be ready to go home. Like Charlie, Othman finds the culture of binge drinking "weird", but he has been curious about what it feels like to be drunk - just not enough to be tempted into trying it.
Charlie is happy with her decision to stop, saying: "There's never a moment in my mind that I doubt that I've made the right decision. I never actually think that [drinking] would be the best thing for me because I know that it's not. I've changed a lot since I stopped drinking. I've stopped doing things I'm not proud of. I'm a nicer person, a better friend, a better student, a more interesting person. Like I have hobbies and interests, I'm into yoga and meditation and philosophy, and I'm actually into those things."
