UK needs a national strategy to tackle harms of alcohol, argue experts

Record numbers of alcohol deaths in England prompt calls for increased and sustained health funding

2025-01-16

(Press-News.org) The UK needs an overarching national strategy to tackle alcohol related harms, argue experts in The BMJ today, as deaths from alcohol in England reach their highest level on record.

Julia Sinclair at the University of Southampton and colleagues warn that successive government cuts have led to reduced provision and quality of alcohol treatment, and say sustained funding is needed for screening and care, while industry must also shoulder some of the costs.

Alcohol is widely available and drunk by around 80% of adults in the UK and is now well established as a leading preventable cause of cancer and a significant contributor to health inequalities and premature death, they explain.

Deaths from alcohol specific causes in England rose by 42% between 2019 and 2023, the highest number on record, most of them from alcohol related liver disease.

Yet they argue that successive government budget cuts have led to reduced provision and quality of alcohol treatment since the Health and Social Care Act 2013.

For instance, in 2020-21, less than 1% of people being treated for alcohol dependence in England and Wales received treatment in a residential rehabilitation setting, compared with the European average of 11%, and only 15-18% of people who are alcohol dependent access alcohol services.

As a result, unscheduled hospital admissions for alcohol withdrawal have increased substantially, highlighting a missed opportunity for early intervention and saving NHS resources.

A national strategy to tackle the harms caused by alcohol is long overdue and important for reducing health inequalities, they say.

This includes routine screening in primary care, acute hospitals, and mental health services to help clinicians identify higher risk alcohol use and related harms, such as liver disease, at an earlier stage. This, in turn, would improve outcomes, better target treatment where it is most effective, and generate data to facilitate quality improvements.

Sustained funding is also needed to develop and deliver integrated alcohol care pathways across health and social care, they say.

For instance, between 2010 and 2020, 48% of people who died by suicide while under the care of mental health services had a history of problematic alcohol use. Yet despite numerous policy recommendations, few mental health trusts have a crisis care pathway in place to respond to the needs of suicidal people who are also alcohol dependent.

A national strategy would also help frame a more consistent response to the tobacco, gambling, and alcohol industries, they add, noting that whereas the gambling industry is subject to a “polluter pays” levy for associated health and social harms, alcohol producers have received a decade of cuts or freezes to alcohol duty, widening rather than limiting their market.

They point to Scotland’s alcohol strategy, which established national data systems on hospital admissions for alcohol harm by levels of deprivation, introduced public health measures (including a minimum unit pricing) and evaluated its impact.

“The costs of alcohol harms to individuals and society are well documented, at over £27bn in England alone, but, as the progress made in Scotland shows, much can be done when there is the government will to do it,” they conclude.

[Ends]

END

ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Aerobic exercise: a powerful ally in the fight against Alzheimer’s

2025-01-16

Regular aerobic exercise could significantly reduce disease markers associated with Alzheimer’s, new research led by scientists at the University of Bristol (UK) and the Federal University of São Paulo (Brazil) has found. The findings provide new hope in the battle against this devastating disorder. Published in the journal Brain Research, the study highlights how physical activity not only protects healthy brain cells but also restores balance in the aging brain. The research focused on ...

Cambridge leads first phase of governmental project to understand impact of smartphones and social media on young people

2025-01-16

Cambridge researchers are leading the first phase of a new research project that will lay the groundwork for future studies into the impact on children of smartphone and social media use. The work has been commissioned by the UK government’s Department for Science, Innovation and Technology after a review by the UK Chief Medical Officer in 2019 found the evidence base around the links to children’s mental health were insufficient to provide strong conclusions suitable to inform policy. The project – led by a team at the University of Cambridge, in collaboration with researchers at several leading UK universities ...

AASM Foundation partners with Howard University Medical Alumni Association to provide scholarships

2025-01-15

DARIEN, IL — The American Academy of Sleep Medicine Foundation is proud to announce a partnership with the Howard University Medical Alumni Association to support medical students at Howard University. Through the HUMAA scholarship program, the AASM Foundation is sponsoring five scholarships, each valued at $3,000. “By supporting medical students at Howard University, we’re empowering the next generation of medical professionals who will shape the future of health care,” said Dr. R. Nisha Aurora, president of the AASM Foundation. “We’re also hoping to inspire students to consider careers ...

Protective actions need regulatory support to fully defend homeowners and coastal communities, study finds

2025-01-15

As climate change drives increasingly severe hurricanes, U.S. coastal communities are bearing the brunt of mounting losses. With regulations failing to curb the damage, homeowners have become the front line of defense — but their efforts often fall short, a recent study reveals. Led by Tracy Kijewski-Correa, professor of engineering and global affairs at the Keough School of Global Affairs at the University of Notre Dame, the study, published in the International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, explored how homeowners respond in the aftermath of hurricanes when reconstruction becomes ...

On-chip light control of semiconductor optoelectronic devices using integrated metasurfaces

2025-01-15

A new publication from Opto-Electronic Advances; DOI 10.29026/oea.2025.240159, discusses on-chip light control of semiconductor optoelectronic devices using integrated metasurfaces. Since the initial demonstration of the first semiconductor laser in the early 1960s, semiconductor optoelectronic devices have achieved unparalleled commercial success and permeated every facet of human lives from communication, lighting, and entertainment to medicine. Furthermore, in response to the emergence of novel applications, such as the consumer electronics, AR/VR ...

America’s political house can become less divided

2025-01-15

Maytal Saar-Tsechansky was standing a few meters from Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995, when he was assassinated by a right-wing extremist in Tel Aviv. “At the time, Rabin was promoting peace with the Palestinians,” says Saar-Tsechansky, professor of information, risk, and operations management and the Mary John and Ralph Spence Centennial Professor at Texas McCombs. “The assassination was the result of a lot of incitement, of some people claiming that he was the enemy of the people.” Although she typically studies artificial intelligence, the traumatic incident planted a seed for a different interest: how to ease political divisions. She began ...

A common antihistamine shows promise in treating liver complications of a rare disease complication

2025-01-15

A common antihistamine may offer hope for patients with a rare genetic disease that can lead to severe liver damage and ultimately require transplantation, according to new research from Rutgers Health. The study in Cellular and Molecular Gastroenterology and Hepatology found that chlorcyclizine, a decades-old allergy medication, could potentially treat erythropoietic protoporphyria (EPP), a condition that creates extreme skin light sensitivity and can produce toxic levels of protoporphyrin in the liver, bone marrow, red cells, and plasma. "There is an unmet need for these patients," said Bishr Omary, senior ...

Trastuzumab emtansine improves long-term survival in HER2 breast cancer

2025-01-15

In patients with high-risk HER2-positive breast cancer, post-surgery, or adjuvant, treatment with trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1) reduced the long-term risk of death or invasive disease by 46% and improved survival compared to trastuzumab alone, according to the final results of the phase 3 KATHERINE clinical trial led by researchers from the University of Pittsburgh and UPMC Hillman Cancer Center. The findings, published today in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM), provide long-term evidence that T-DM1 is an effective adjuvant treatment for this population of breast ...

Is eating more red meat bad for your brain?

2025-01-15

MINNEAPOLIS — People who eat more red meat, especially processed red meat like bacon, sausage and bologna, are more likely to have a higher risk of cognitive decline and dementia when compared to those who eat very little red meat, according to a study published in the January 15, 2025, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. “Red meat is high in saturated fat and has been shown in previous studies to increase the risk of type 2 diabetes and heart disease, which are both linked to reduced brain health,” said ...

How does Tourette syndrome differ by sex?

2025-01-15

MINNEAPOLIS — Tourette syndrome is currently diagnosed about three times more frequently in males than in females. A new study finds that female individuals are less likely to be diagnosed with the syndrome, take longer to receive a diagnosis and are older when they are diagnosed than male individuals. The study is published in the January 15, 2025, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. Tourette syndrome is a neurodevelopmental disorder defined by ...

UK needs a national strategy to tackle harms of alcohol, argue experts

ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES: