A new study conducted by the Center for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH), the University Hospital of Bordeaux, France, and the World Health Organization (WHO) has found that individuals with drug addiction alcohol who undergo rehabilitation or maintain abstinence experience significantly lower risks of developing associated cancers.
Alcohol-associated cancers
The work, entitled “Alcohol rehabilitation and cancer risk: a nationwide hospital cohort study in France,” was published in The Lancet Public Health . It is the largest of its kind to provide evidence linking reduction or cessation of alcohol consumption with a decreased risk of all cancers attributable to alcohol, including liver and throat cancers.
The nationwide retrospective cohort study analyzed data from more than 24 million French people, all adults residing in mainland France and discharged from hospitals between 2018 and 2021. The researchers found that around 6.3% of men and 1.6% of women had alcohol dependence, which was strongly associated with alcohol-related cancers, including hepatocellular carcinoma, as well as cancers of the oral cavity, pharynx, larynx, esophagus, and colorectal , in both sexes.
They also found that rehabilitation treatment or a history of abstinence were associated with significantly lower risks than alcohol dependence without rehabilitation or abstinence. This highlights the effectiveness of treatment strategies in combating cancer risks related to alcohol addiction.
The research team was surprised by the effect size of the therapeutic intervention in this study,” said Dr. Jürgen Rehm, senior scientist at the Institute for Mental Health Policy Research at CAMH and senior author of the study. “We know that treatment for alcohol dependence is effective, but the fact that alcohol dependence is a chronic, recurrent disease often makes us forget that even with relapses, periods of abstinence significantly reduce the risk of cancer and other chronic diseases.” .
“From a public health perspective, our research highlights a worrying neglect of alcohol dependence compared to other health problems in both research and policy priorities,” added the paper’s lead author, Dr. Michaël Schwarzinger, Department of Prevention, University Hospital of Bordeaux. “As a result, alcohol dependence continues to be a silent and terrible epidemic in countries like France, especially when you consider that the average annual level of per capita alcohol consumption among adults in that country is more than double the global average.
“We know that the most effective strategy to reduce the overall burden of alcohol-related harm, including cancer, lies in population-level policies, measures such as increasing alcohol taxes, reducing the availability of alcohol and prohibition or restriction of marketing,” said Dr. Carina Ferreira-Borges, Regional Advisor on Alcohol, Illicit Drugs and Prison Health at the WHO Regional Office for Europe.
“This study highlights that the response of health systems is also crucial to reduce the risk of cancers attributable to alcohol. By increasing accessibility to alcohol rehabilitation and abstinence interventions in healthcare settings, countries could do more to protect their populations from preventable cancers. We therefore call for greater investment in rehabilitation and treatment services for alcohol use disorders in France and other countries in the WHO European Region.”
Dr. Leslie Buckley, CAMH’s Chief Addictions Officer, highlighted the importance of these findings, saying: “In Canada, hospital admissions for conditions attributable to alcohol exceed those for myocardial infarction, and many people face barriers to alcohol-based treatment. evidence due to stigma and challenges in accessing in-person care.
Innovations such as virtual treatment can overcome these challenges by offering flexible and cost-effective solutions. At CAMH, we are conducting research into fully virtual day programs that show promising results, replicating the intensity of traditional rehabilitation without the need for physical infrastructure, thus reducing wait times and making care more accessible.
“Given the impending increase in alcohol availability in Ontario, it is essential to consider how to make treatment more accessible. Increased availability of alcohol will likely lead to higher consumption, and accessible virtual treatment programs could address this by providing crucial care to those who need it.”
2.6 million die every year due to alcohol
Alcohol kills nearly three million people every year, the World Health Organization said on Tuesday, adding that while the death rate has fallen slightly in recent years, it remained “unacceptably high.”
The latest report from the United Nations health agency on alcohol and health states that alcohol causes almost one in 20 deaths each year globally, due to drink-driving, alcohol-induced violence and abuse. alcohol and a multitude of diseases and disorders.
The report says 2.6 million deaths were attributed to alcohol use in 2019 – the latest available statistics – accounting for 4.7% of all deaths globally that year. Nearly three-quarters of those deaths were men.
“Substance use seriously harms individual health, increasing the risk of chronic diseases and mental health problems and tragically causing millions of avoidable deaths every year,” said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
He highlighted that since 2010 there has been “some reduction in alcohol consumption and related harms worldwide”.
“The health and social burden of alcohol consumption remains unacceptably high,” he continued, underlining that younger people have been disproportionately affected.
The highest proportion of deaths attributable to alcohol in 2019 – 13% – occurred among people aged 20 to 39, the WHO said.
Alcohol consumption is linked to a number of health conditions, including liver cirrhosis and some cancers. Of all deaths caused in 2019, the report found that around 1.6 million were from non-communicable diseases. Of these, 474,000 were from cardiovascular disease, 401,000 from cancer and as many as 724,000 from injuries, including road accidents and self-harm.
Alcohol abuse also makes people more susceptible to infectious diseases such as tuberculosis, HIV and pneumonia, the report finds. An estimated 209 million people were living with alcohol dependence in 2019, or 3.7% of the global population. Total per capita consumption worldwide fell slightly to 5.5 liters of alcohol in 2019 from 5.7 liters nine years earlier, the report found.
Alcohol consumption overall is unevenly distributed around the world. Well over half of the world’s population over the age of 15 abstains completely. Europe represents by far the country with the highest levels of alcohol consumption per capita, with 9.2 litres, followed by the Americas with 7.5 litres.
The lowest consumption is seen in Muslim-majority countries in North Africa, the Middle East and Asia, the report said. Among people who drank alcohol in 2019, the report found that on average they consumed 27 grams of pure alcohol per day. This is roughly equivalent to two glasses of wine, two small bottles of beer, or two shots of spirits.
“This level and frequency of alcohol consumption is associated with an increased risk of numerous health conditions and associated mortality and disability,” the WHO warned. In 2019, as many as 38% of current drinkers admitted to heavy episodic drinking, defined as consuming at least 60 grams of pure alcohol on one or more occasions in the previous month.
Globally, 23.5% of young people aged 15 to 19 are considered current drinkers. This percentage jumped to over 45% for people in this age group living in Europe, and to nearly 44% in the Americas. The WHO has said that improving access to quality treatment for substance use disorders is essential.
In 2019, the percentage of people contacting such treatment services ranged from less than 1% to 35% in countries providing this data. “Stigma, discrimination and misconceptions about the effectiveness of treatment contribute to these critical gaps in treatment delivery,” Vladimir Poznyak, head of the WHO’s alcohol, drugs and behavior unit, told reporters. of addiction.
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