Nov. 1 (UPI) — Pre-pandemic, an estimated 1 in 8 total deaths among U.S. adults ages 20 to 64 were attributable to excessive alcohol use. And it accounted for roughly 1 in 5 deaths among adults ages 20 to 49 over the same period, between 2015 and 2019.
That’s according to a study led by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which maintains that the number of premature deaths could be reduced by taking such steps as increasing alcohol taxes or regulating the density of stores selling alcohol.
The original investigation appeared Tuesday in JAMA Network Open.
Alcohol consumption is a leading preventable cause of death in the United States, the researchers said in their paper, noting death rates among adults ages 20 to 64 from “fully alcohol-attributable causes,” such as alcoholic liver disease, have increased in the past decade
So, the scientists set out to analyze deaths fully and partially attributable to excessive alcohol use among this population, including a breakdown of variations by sex, age group and state.
The estimates from a study of 694,660 mean deaths annually between 2015 and 2019 suggest that excessive alcohol consumption accounted for 12.9% of total deaths among adults aged 20 to 64 years, and 20.3% of deaths among adults aged 20 to 49 years.
This percentage was higher among men, at 15%, than women, at 9.4%.
By state, alcohol-attributable deaths ranged from 9.3% of total deaths in Mississippi to 21.7% in New Mexico, the scientists said.
According to the study, the three leading causes of alcohol-attributable deaths by age group were the same for men and women: in adults aged 20 to 34 years, the causes were “other poisonings,” motor vehicle traffic crashes and homicide.
In adults aged 35 to 49 years, the leading causes of alcohol-attributable deaths were “other poisonings,” alcoholic liver disease, and motor vehicle traffic crashes.
The researchers cited some study limitations, noting alcohol-attributable death estimates “may be conservative” because they are based on deaths due to alcohol-related conditions that were identified as the underlying cause of death only — and contributing causes of death were not included.
Marissa B. Esser, a researcher in the Division of Population Health at the CDC’s National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, is the study’s corresponding author.
