A TIPPLE TOO FAR
Too many drinks in lockdown could mean trouble for your liver, writes
STUCK at home with pubs and restaurants closed, schools on hiatus and a global pandemic to face up to, it’s little wonder many of us leaned on a tipple or two from the drinks cupboard this year.
Figures from Alcohol Change UK (alcoholchange. org.uk) suggest that more than a quarter of people in the UK think they have drunk more during lockdown, while offlicence sales soared during the spring months.
Needless to say, all that extra boozing probably isn’t great for our health. Aside from leaving you with an unpleasant hangover the next morning after, drinking alcohol can increase your risk of developing liver disease and potentially cause irreparable damage to this important organ.
Should you be concerned? And can you do anything to reverse the damage of lockdown-related drinking? We talked to some experts to find out how to help keep your liver happy and healthy...
Why is the liver so important?
The liver is a large organ located in the right upper abdomen. Every day, it performs more than 500 vital tasks, essential for survival.
“Our liver is a vital organ because it essentially works to filter out all the nasty toxins that enter our body through food, drink and medicines we consume,” said Dr Aragona Giuseppe, GP and medical advisor at Prescription Doctor (prescriptiondoctor.com). “Our food and drink is first digested by the stomach and intestines, before being absorbed into the blood stream and heading to the liver.”
Dr Giuseppe says the liver is a particularly clever organ because it knows when it needs to eliminate toxins from the body through excretion, and when to keep vital nutrients by releasing them back into the blood.
Alcohol can have a damaging effect
Dr Giuseppe says the liver goes into overdrive to break down most of the alcohol that a person drinks, so it can then be excreted from the body.
However, this process results in a chemical reaction that can be detrimental to the cells of the liver, causing damage.
Drinking too much (even binge-drinking over the lockdown period) can potentially trigger a build up of fat and prevent the liver from carrying out other vital functions in the body. He added: “Conditions that damage the liver can lead to scaring (or cirrhosis), as the liver attempts to repair itself.”
Over time, scarring can eventually lead to liver failure, a life-threatening condition. However, early treatment may help give the liver time to heal.
Dr Giuseppe said: “It’s important that we take care of our liver because it performs more jobs than most of our other organs put together.”