‘Alcohol net zo gevaarlijk als tabak’
De strijd tegen alcohol lijkt op stoom te komen met de resultaten van een nieuw onderzoek door een reeks internationale wetenschappers. In een artikel in het Engelse wetenschappelijke tijdschrift “The Lancet” tonen ze aan dat alcohol verantwoordelijk is voor 4% van alle ziektegevallen, vergeleken met 4,1% voor tabak en 4,4% door hoge bloeddruk.
De auteurs pleiten voor meer alcoholregulering en remmen op de verkoop van het goedje.
Alcoholic beverages, and the problems they engender, have been familiar fixtures in human societies since the beginning of recorded history. We review advances in alcohol science in terms of three topics: the epidemiology of alcohol’s role in health and illness; the treatment of alcohol use disorders in a public health perspective; and policy research and options. Research has contributed substantially to our understanding of the relation of drinking to specific disorders, and has shown that the relation between alcohol consumption and health outcomes is complex and multidimensional. Alcohol is causally related to more than 60 different medical conditions. Overall, 4% of the global burden of disease is attributable to alcohol, which accounts for about as much death and disability globally as tobacco and hypertension. Treatment research shows that early intervention in primary care is feasible and effective, and a variety of behavioural and pharmacological interventions are available to treat alcohol dependence. This evidence suggests that treatment of alcohol-related problems should be incorporated into a public health response to alcohol problems. Additionally, evidence-based preventive measures are available at both the individual and population levels, with alcohol taxes, restrictions on alcohol availability, and drinking-driving countermeasures among the most effective policy options. Despite the scientific advances, alcohol problems continue to present a major challenge to medicine and public health, in part because population-based public health approaches have been neglected in favour of approaches oriented to the individual that tend to be more palliative than preventative.
We hebben helaas geen toegang tot de letterlijke tekst van het rapport om te analyseren hoe sterk de bewijslast is, maar gezien het soort onderzoek (epidemiologie) en onze ervaringen daarmee zal het onderzoek waarschijnlijk gekenmerkt worden door:
- Minimale verhoogde risico’s
- Lage betrouwbaarheden van de cijfers
- Een alles-of-niets benadering
- Participatie van belanghebbende industrieën
- Een beperkt blikveld: alleen fysieke gezondheid telt mee
- Een barbertje-moet-hangen benadering: een uitkomst die van tevoren al vaststond
The Lancet
Vertaling van Engels BBC artikel
Washington Times:
Skeptics argue that smoking causes many more deaths than drinking, adding that it has been long listed as the most preventable cause of death in the United States.
Mr. Room doesn’t dispute that fact but adds that deaths from smoking are usually in older people than those from drinking. When the two are compared on the basis of years of life lost, he said, they are about equal.
