Surge in liver disease from lockdown boozing

DEATHS from alcohol-related liver disease reached record levels at the height of the Covid pandemic, NHS figures have revealed.

More than 5,200 people under 75 lost their lives to the condition in 2020 – 20 per cent more than the year before and the highest number since records began.

Hospitalisations related to the disease also reached unprecedented levels that year, rising to 25,000 – a jump of 57 per cent since 2010.

While experts blamed the excessive drinking on lockdowns, the problem has not diminished and they are still seeing unusually high levels of alcohol-related illness.

‘Many of the people who started drinking excessively during lockdown are still doing it,’ says Professor Simon Taylor-Robinson, a liver expert at Imperial College London.

The liver helps filter toxins out of the body and is able to regenerate even after contact with harmful chemicals, but prolonged alcohol misuse can leave permanent scarring – an irreversible condition known as cirrhosis. Half of patients who develop the disease and continue drinking die within five years.

UK Addiction Treatment (UKAT), which runs eight rehab facilities and published the analysis, is calling on the Government to do more to tackle the crisis.

‘The Government needs to take stock of this country’s unhealthy relationship with alcohol,’ says Nuno Albuquerque, head of treatment at UKAT. ‘We’re putting unnecessary pressure on our NHS because, as a nation, we can’t drink alcohol responsibly.’

The analysis of NHS data also showed that hospitals in the Yorkshire and Humber region saw the largest rise in alcoholic liver disease patients in 2020. More than 3,300 people were admitted, up from 2,700 in 2019.