11 August, 2017
Heavy drinking and alcohol use disorders are risk factors associated with health problems such as heart problems, hypertension (high blood pressure), stroke, cancer, and infections.
It found that drinking rates of all groups of Americans increased - and some researchers are calling it a "public health crisis". The study found high-risk drinking among USA adults spiked about 30 percent between 2001-2002 and 2012-2013.
The findings suggest "a public health crisis", the researchers say, given the fact that high-risk drinking is linked to a number of diseases and psychiatric problems, as well as violence, crime and crashes.
High-risk drinking, in this study, referred to women drinking four or more drinks in a day, or men drinking five or more drinks in a day, on a weekly basis. Grant was citing the study's findings that show almost three in four adults now drink alcohol.
Previous research showed steady or declining drinking patterns from the 1970s through the 1990s, the report says.
Continued alcohol use despite having persistent or recurrent social or interpersonal problems caused or exacerbated by the effects of alcohol (e.g., arguments with spouse about consequences of intoxication).
Between 2001 to 2002 and 2012 to 2013, 12-month alcohol use overall increased from 65.4% to 72.7% of the total population, a relative increase of 11.2%, the study discovered.
Though the nation's focus may be turned to the deadly opioid epidemic, a new study has discovered that the use of another prevalent drug is also on the rise: alcohol. Among the poor (earning less than $20,000) it rose by 65.9 percent.
These calls for new public health strategies are all the more important because though alcohol abuse is a widespread issue, treatment rates remain disproportionately low. Deborah Hasin, the study's lead author and a professor at Columbia University, noted that while light drinking has been helpful for people's health overall, heavy drinking can often lead to some harms and impairment. And it's worrying, because older adults at are a high risk of death, injury or disease connected to alcohol use - from falls, for instance, or from adverse interactions between drugs and drinking.
Psychotherapist Alexis Michael joined Morning Dose on Thursday and said it's because women are catching up with men. A study shows that women form the larger part of the alcohol abuse.
A separate study looking at differences between the two federal surveys found that the disparities are likely caused by how each survey asks about alcohol disorders: it found that the NESARC questionnaire used in the current study is a "more sensitive instrument" that leads to a "more thorough probing" of the alcohol use disorder criteria.
