Does kissing someone who drinks alcohol transmit alcohol?

According to Dr. Tran Van Phuc, Xanh Pon General Hospital (Hanoi), the amount of alcohol in the body is mainly excreted through urine, the rest through sweat and breath. When a person drinks alcohol, there will be alcohol in their breath and saliva, especially the reflux from the stomach to the mouth has a relatively high alcohol concentration.

Therefore, when kissing a drunk person for a relatively long time, you can "catch" the alcohol concentration from them. After kissing, your mouth is also contaminated with alcohol from the saliva or refluxed gastric juice of the drunk person.

However, the amount of alcohol entering the mouth and respiratory tract of the person kissing has a low concentration and is quickly metabolized in the liver, so it cannot cause intoxication.

According to Decree 168/2024/ND-CP regulating administrative penalties for violations of traffic order and safety in the field of road traffic, the lowest fine for drivers of cars on the road with alcohol concentration in blood or breath is 6 - 8 million VND if the alcohol concentration in blood or breath does not exceed 50 mg/100 ml of blood or does not exceed 0.25 mg/l of breath; the highest is 30 - 40 million VND if the alcohol concentration in blood or breath exceeds 80 mg/100 ml of blood or exceeds 0.4 mg/l of breath.

The corresponding fines for the above violations for motorcyclists are 2 - 3 million VND and 8 - 10 million VND.

In case of participating in traffic after kissing a drunk person and the breath test shows alcohol concentration, you can ask the officer to let you rest for 15 minutes and then measure again or request a blood test for accurate results.