DYING FOR A DRINK
DEATHS CAUSED BY ALCOHOL ARE KILLING MORE PEOPLE THAN EVER
MORE than 7,000 people were killed in the UK because of alcoholspecific illnesses in 2016, recent figures have shown.
Alcohol-specific deaths include any deaths that are a direct consequence of alcohol consumption.
Those can be from any of 15 conditions including alcoholic liver disease, alcoholinduced heart disease and alcohol poisoning.
Some 7,323 people died in 2016 as a direct consequence of alcohol . Since 2001, there have been 108,074 alcohol-specific deaths - and the yearly figure is on the rise. In 2015 there were 7,006 people who died because of alcohol, and the year previously there were 7,002. In 2013 some 6,791 deaths were caused by alcohol, a rise from the 6,669 in in 2012. The highest number of deaths recorded per year was in 2008 - when 7,347 people died because of alcohol. By 2016, the largest number of deaths per age range was for those aged between 50 and 54 - some 1,152 people died.
This was closely followed by 55-59 year olds, with 1,124 alcohol-specific deaths.
Meanwhile, one child aged under the age of one died because of fetal alcohol syndrome - caused by excessive drinking during pregnancy.
Scotland saw the most deaths by alcohol per head in the UK. Some 30.9 men and 12.1 women died for every 100,000 people living there. There were 22.2 men and 11.8 women in Northern Ireland killed per 100,000 people by boozing. In Wales, 17.4 men and 8.3 women died per 100,000 people due to alcohol. England saw the fewest deaths caused by alcohol per 100,000 people, with 14.5 men and 6.8 women dying because of it.
The most common cause of alcoholspecific death was alcoholic liver disease - which took 5,777 lives across the UK. This includes liver cirrhosis and hepatitis.
There were a further 868 deaths caused by mental and behavioural disorders due to the use of alcohol.
Some 12 people died because of a degeneration of the nervous system.
One person died because of alcoholic myopathy - a disease where muscle fibres do not function properly, leading to muscle weakness.
Dr James Nicholls, director of research and policy development at Alcohol Concern said: “More men die from alcohol-related causes than women because more men drink than women, and particularly because very heavy drinkers are much more likely to be men. “As overall consumption falls, you would hope that deaths would also decline but this depends on the proportion of people who are drinking very heavily. “Most deaths from liver disease are due to alcohol, but heavy drinking also increases the risk of a range of other conditions including some cancers, pancreatitis, high blood pressure and stroke.”