Eyes on control as alcohol claims 2.8m lives yearly

Even as more than three million economically active Kenyans continue to seek solace in the bottle, a new study shows that alcohol abuse has become a pressing global challenge that consigns millions to early grave.

A study published in The Lancet, a weekly medical journal, on August 23 indicates that alcohol is associated with more than 2.8 million deaths each year worldwide.

One in three people (32.5 per cent) drinks alcohol, the global survey finds, implying that 2.4 billion people are affected globally.

Of these 2.2 per cent of women and 6.8 per cent of men die from alcohol-related health problems each year. “Alcohol poses dire ramifications for future population health in the absence of policy action today,” says Emmanuela Gakidou, a professor at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, University of Washington. “Our results indicate that alcohol use and its harmful effects on health could become a growing challenge as countries become more developed, and enacting or maintaining strong alcohol control policies will be vital.”

In Kenya, a survey released last month by the National Authority for the Campaign Against Drug Abuse (Nacada) categorises 2.8 million drinkers as having alcohol abuse disorders.

The survey conducted through 2017 found that a total of 3.3 million Kenyans aged between 15 and 65 drink some form of alcohol.

The product range commonly abused include busaa, chang’aa, muratina, distilled spirits and wines, some of which have been the target of a government-led crackdown seeking to rid the market of second generation brands. “The findings demonstrate that the enforcement of the Alcoholic Drinks Control Act 2010 or the County Alcoholic Drinks Control Act is inadequate,” states Nacada. “This has led to the proliferation of illicit brews and an increase in the number of liquor selling outlets”.

READ: Anti-drinking campaign lowers alcohol consumption rate in central Kenya

And while Kenya was not part of its area of survey, Lancet professors appear to echo Nacada’s concerns.

Says Prof Gakidou, “We need to revisit alcohol control policies and health programmes worldwide, and to consider recommendations for abstaining from alcohol.” He proposes high excise taxes on alcohol, controlling the physical availability and the hours of sale, and controlling advertising.

“Any of these policy actions would contribute to reduction in population-level consumption, a vital step towards decreasing the health loss associated with alcohol use,” he says. It is instructive to note that all these proposals have been put to practice in Kenya without noticeable impact on the national drinking culture.

Alcohol is a leading risk factor for death and disease worldwide, and is associated with nearly one in 10 deaths in people aged 15-49 years old, according to the Global Burden of Disease study published in The Lancet.

Authors of the study, which estimates levels of alcohol use and health effects in 195 countries between 1990 and 2016, suggest that there is no safe level of alcohol.

Any health benefits of alcohol are outweighed by its adverse effects, particularly cancers, the authors say. They estimate that one alcoholic drink a day for people aged 15-95 for a year increases the risk of developing one of 23 alcohol-related health problems by 0.5 per cent.

Alcohol has a complex association with health, affecting it in multiple ways, states The Lancet study.

Regular consumption has adverse effects on organs and tissues, acute intoxication can lead to injuries or poisoning, and alcohol dependence may lead to frequent intoxication, self-harm or violence.

“Previous studies found a protective effect of alcohol on some conditions, but we found that the combined health risks associated with alcohol increase with any amount of alcohol,” says lead author Max Griswold of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, University of Washington

“In particular, the strong association between alcohol consumption and the risk of cancer, injuries, and infectious diseases offset the protective effects for ischaemic heart disease in women in our study.”

The highest number of alcohol drinkers were in Denmark, 95.3 per cent of women, and 97.1 per cent of men, while the lowest was in Pakistan, 0.8 per cent of men. Bangladeshi women drank the least at 0.3 per cent of their population.

Men in Romania and women in Ukraine drank the most (8.2 and 4.2 drinks a day respectively), whereas men in Pakistan and women in Iran drank the least (0.0007 and 0.0003 drinks a day respectively). The Lancet study found that in 2006, alcohol was the leading risk factor in people aged 15-49 years old, with 3.8 per cent of deaths in women and 12.2 per cent in men attributable to the substance abuse.

The main causes of alcohol-related deaths in this age group were found to be tuberculosis (1.4 per cent), road injuries (1.2 per cent), and self-harm (1.1 per cent).

For people aged 50 years and older, cancers were a leading cause of alcohol-related death, constituting 27.1 per cent of deaths in women and 18.9 per cent in men, the study states.