Excessive alcohol use contributes to over 200 diseases and
injury-related health conditions. Alcoholism is especially prevalent in
the food service, construction, mining and drilling, excavation, and
maintenance industries.
Specific Alcohol-Related Injuries and Damages
Alcohol
can affect all parts of the body, but alcohol’s active ingredient,
ethanol, particularly affects the brain, stomach, heart, gallbladder,
and immune system. Because it is a toxin, it damages nerve cells. It
also causes chemical changes in the brain and shrinkage of brain tissue.
Heavy drinking damages blood vessels and is linked to high blood
pressure, raised cholesterol levels, and increased risk of heart attacks
and strokes. Alcohol also irritates the stomach lining, leading to
vomiting and poor absorption of nutrients, making it easy for users to
become vitamin deficient.
Short-term health risks surrounding
alcohol use include injuries, including motor vehicle crashes, falls,
drowning, and burns; violence, including homicide, suicide, sexual
assault, and intimate partner violence; risky sexual behaviors; and
miscarriage and stillbirth or fetal alcohol spectrum disorders among
pregnant women.
Fetal alcohol exposure can occur when a woman
drinks excessively while pregnant. Alcohol can disrupt fetal development
at any stage during a pregnancy, including the earliest stages, before a
woman knows she is pregnant. Research shows that binge drinking and
regular heavy drinking put a fetus at the greatest risk for severe
problems. Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD) can cause brain damage
which lead to a range of developmental, cognitive, and behavioral
problems that can appear at any time during childhood. FASD is the
umbrella term for different diagnoses, including Fetal Alcohol Syndrome.
Data suggests that 20-30% of women drink at some time during pregnancy.
Binge
drinking can be associated with other conditions, including brain
damage, alcohol poisoning, and alcoholic blackouts. Many young people
are binge drinkers, like college students who consume great quantities
of alcohol in short time frames. Because younger drinkers are less
experienced, their risk of suffering from alcohol poisoning is much
higher. Alcohol consumption can thin the pre-frontal cortex in the brain
of young people. This area of the brain is responsible for functions
like decision making, emotional responses, and impulse control. Heavy
drinking in young adulthood can pave the way for a tendency to drink
excessively in later years.
Over time, excessive alcohol use can
lead to chronic diseases and other conditions including high blood
pressure, an irregular heartbeat, heart disease, stroke, liver
cirrhosis, disease, or failure, and digestive problems; cancer of the
breast, mouth, throat, esophagus, liver, and colon; learning and memory
problems, including dementia and poor school or work performance; mental
health problems, including depression and anxiety; and social problems,
including family problems and unemployment.
Alcoholism increases
a person’s risk of developing common types of dementia such as
Alzheimer’s disease and vascular dementia. Alcoholism can also cause
alcohol-related brain damage (ARBD), a term that covers several
different conditions including alcoholic dementia, a long-term decline
in memory, and Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome (WKS). WKS is a chronic
memory disorder caused by severe deficiency of thiamine (vitamin B-1)
that causes vision changes, ataxia (loss of full control of bodily
movements), and impaired memory. WKS has a relatively low prevalence,
but researchers believe the disease is under-reported and
under-diagnosed. Based on clinical research studies, 22% to 29% of
individuals with dementia were found to be heavy drinkers or alcoholics.
Medical researchers are still struggling with how to fully define the
association between heavy alcohol use and symptoms of dementia.
Individually,
excessive alcohol use can damage a user’s emotional stability,
finances, career, and can impact family, friends, and coworkers.
Additionally, excessive drinking has larger societal implications. In
2010, alcohol misuse problems cost the federal government $249 billion,
or about $2.05 per drink. Two out of every five dollars of these costs
were paid by federal, state, and local governments, making the case that
society pays for excessive alcohol use.
The CDC found that the
main costs of excessive drinking result from losses in workplace
productivity (72% of total cost), health care expenses for treating
problems caused by drinking (11%), law enforcement and other criminal
justice expenses (10%), and losses from motor vehicle crashes related to
alcohol use (5%). The CDC believes that these numbers are
underestimations of the true cost of excessive drinking, because
information on alcohol use is often underreported or unavailable.
One-third
of all suicides, one-half of all murders, and one-half of domestic
violence cases are alcohol related. 25% to 40% of all hospital beds in
the United States (except for those being used by maternity and
intensive care patients) are being used to treat health conditions that
are related to alcohol consumption. Drunk drivers are responsible for
50% of people killed on the road.
Some Benefits of Alcohol
Researchers
agree that alcohol is both a poison and a tonic, with the difference
lying in quantity. Many studies support the idea that moderate alcohol
consumption can benefit a consumers’ health, with “moderate consumption”
meaning up to one drink per day for women and up to two drinks per day
for men. This definition is for one single day, and is not intended as
an average over several days. Most studies do not distinguish between
different types of alcohol, but in a few studies, wine appears to be
more beneficial than beer or liquor.
Harvard University’s School
of Public Health found that moderate amounts of alcohol raise levels of
high-density lipoprotein, HDL, or ‘good’ cholesterol and higher HDL
levels are associated with possible protection against heart disease.
Moderate alcohol consumption has also been linked with beneficial
changes ranging from better sensitivity to insulin to improvements in
factors that influence blood clotting. Such changes would tend to
prevent the formation of small blood clots that can block arteries in
the heart, neck, and brain, the ultimate cause of many heart attacks and
the most common kind of stroke.
Researchers have found that
drinking two drinks of alcohol per day can reduce the risk of gallstones
by one-third. Another study found that drinking moderate amounts might
be good for the heart and circulatory system, and could offer some
protection against type 2 diabetes and gallstones. A drink before a meal
can improve digestion. Light to moderate drinking seems to reduce the
risk for dementia and cognitive decline by 23%. Researchers say that
small amounts of alcohol might make brain cells more fit by causing
stress on the cells and toughening them, preparing them to cope with
worse stressors down the road that could cause dementia.