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• 1 in 25 deaths worldwide linked to alcohol consumption, study finds 

One in every 25 deaths worldwide can be linked to diseases or injuries related to alcohol consumption, concludes a Canadian-led study, which equates the libation's burden of harm to that of smoking almost a decade ago.

In 2004, the most recent year for which global statistics are available, 3.8 per cent of all deaths were attributable to alcohol (6.3 per cent for men and 1.8 per cent for women), the study found.

Most of the deaths blamed on booze result from injuries, cancer, cardiovascular disease, liver disorders like cirrhosis and violence, say the authors, whose study is one in a series of papers on the global impact of alcohol published in The Lancet this week. . . .

"Worldwide, more people abstain than drink," principal researcher Jurgen Rehm, a senior scientist at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto, said Thursday. . . .

Rehm said the global burden of disease from drinking is about the same size as that of smoking in 2000 (tobacco use rates have been steadily dropping in some countries due to public health measures), but is sure to get worse as more people add wine, beer and spirits to their list of libations. "The big message is treat alcohol like tobacco," not as a substance that is relatively benign except for "those bad alcoholics," he said. "That is not true, neither for Canada nor globally."

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Study blames alcohol for half 1990s Russian deaths 

A new study by an international team of public health researchers documents the devastating impact of alcohol abuse on Russia — showing that drinking caused more than half of deaths among Russians aged 15 to 54 in the turbulent era following the Soviet collapse.

The 52 percent figure compares to estimates that less than 4 percent of deaths worldwide are caused by alcohol abuse, according to the study by Russian, British and French researchers published in Friday's edition of the British medical journal The Lancet.

The Russian findings were based on a survey of almost 49,000 deaths between 1990 and 2001 among young adult and middle-aged Russians in three industrial towns in western Siberia, which had typical 1990s Russian mortality patterns.

Professor David Zaridze, head of the Russian Cancer Research Center and lead author of the study, estimated that the increase in alcohol consumption since 1987, the year when then-Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev's restrictions on alcohol sales collapsed, cost the lives of 3 million Russians who would otherwise be alive today. "This loss is similar to that of a war," Zaridze said. . . .

Some researchers have blamed the crumbling of the Soviet health care system, increased smoking, changes in diet or a loss of jobs that raised stress levels for the mysterious rise in deaths.

Many others, like Zaridze and his team, pin the blame squarely on increased drinking, which the report says roughly doubled in Russia between 1987 and 1994 . . .

"If you look at the dynamics of death and the dynamics of alcohol consumption in Russia, it is obvious that all these sharp increases and decreases of the mortality level are caused by increases and decreases in alcohol consumption," Zaridze said.

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Does binge drinking increase the risk of lung cancer: results from the Findrink study  

Conclusion: Binge drinking is not associated with an increased risk of lung cancer among non-smokers but among smokers, it is associated with an increased risk irrespective of the number of cigarettes smoked daily. Even though the number of lung cancer cases among non-smokers was relatively small, the fact that the increased risk was limited to only smokers means that residual confounding by smoking may play a role. Larger studies are needed to clarify this association.

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• Binge Drinking Increases Risk Of Lung Cancer In Smokers 

The risk of lung cancer increases for those smokers who have a tendency to binge drinking. This was found by the Kuopio Ischemic Heart Disease Risk Factor Study (KIHD), conducted at the University of Kuopio in Finland.

The KIHD study has followed up a cohort of men from eastern Finland for about 17 years. Binge drinking was found be associated with an increased risk of lung cancer among those who had smoked between 1 and 30 years regardless of how many cigarrettes a day they smoked. Meanwhile, binge drinking was not associated with any increased risk of lung cancer among non-smokers.

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• Smoking ban, crisis hit French beer consumption  

The French, already more wine lovers than beer drinkers, cut consumption of ale by 5 percent last year due mainly to a smoking ban in public places and economic gloom, brewers said on Wednesday.

That follows a drop of 3.3 percent in 2007 when France prohibited smoking in restaurants, bars and pubs.

"We are in a severely falling market and this trend is strengthening," said Gerard Laloi, head of a group gathering some 70 breweries which make 99 percent of the French output. The French drank 18.6 million hectoliters of beer in 2008, which puts them in the next-to-last seat in the European Union with an average of 30 liters per year, far behind the Czechs with 160 liters or the English with 110 liters. . . .

ne and wine (OIV).

France's beer habits are also changing, Laloi said.

Consumers are increasingly choosing specialized beers -- Abbaye , amber or white -- or high quality beers.

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Alcohol Consumption, Cigarette Smoking, and the Risk of Recurrent Acute and Chronic Pancreatitis 

Conclusions Very heavy alcohol consumption and smoking are independent risks for CP. A minority of patients with pancreatitis currently seen at US referral centers report very heavy drinking.

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More than one drink daily increases bowel cancer risk 

A study has investigated the colorectal cancer risk attached to key parts of the Australian lifestyle.

Having more than one alcoholic drink a day is enough to dramatically increase your bowel cancer risk, Australian research shows.

Smoking, obesity, diabetes and eating large amounts of meat also push up the risk of developing the aggressive cancer, which claims 4,000 lives across the country every year.

Researchers analysed more than 100 international studies going back to the 1960s, to determine the colorectal cancer risk attached to key parts of the Australian lifestyle.

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Alcohol, Cigarettes and Diabetes Up Colorectal Cancer Risk  

Drinking alcohol, smoking cigarettes and having diabetes also play a major role in determining who is going to develop colorectal cancer, study findings show.

And although exercise seemed to help ward off colorectal cancer, eating lots of fruits and vegetables didn't, according to researchers at The George Institute for International Health in Australia.

"Most people probably know that being overweight and having poor dietary habits are risk factors for the disease," said study author Rachel Huxley, an associate professor at The George Institute. "But most are probably unaware that other lifestyle risk factors such as alcohol consumption, cigarette smoking and diabetes are also important culprits," she said in a news release from the institute.

Not counting skin cancers, colorectal cancer is the third most common cancer among U.S. adults

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Alcohol and smoking the culprits in bowel cancer 

Each year, worldwide around one million new cases of bowel (colorectal) cancer are diagnosed and more than half a million people die from the disease.

In Australia it is the most commonly diagnosed cancer and there are more than 12,000 new cases each year and according to scientists at Sydney's George Institute for International Health, the main culprits in bowel cancer are alcohol and tobacco.

The new research reviewed more than 100 international published studies on the link between major and modifiable risk factors for colorectal cancer including alcohol, smoking, diabetes, physical activity and various dietary components and it has revealed that lifestyle risk factors such as alcohol consumption and cigarette smoking are important risk factors for bowel cancer.

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Alcohol, smoking key causes for bowel cancer: study 

Lifestyle risk factors such as alcohol consumption and cigarette smoking are major risk factors for bowel cancer, a new global study said on Tuesday.

The study was released Tuesday by Australian researchers, who reviewed more than 100 published studies that had reported on the link between major and modifiable risk factors for colorectal cancer including alcohol, smoking, diabetes, physical activity and various dietary components.

Approximately 1 million new cases of bowel cancer are diagnosed worldwide each year, and more than half a million people die from this type of cancer, according to the background information in the study.

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Drinking, smoking significantly increase bowel cancer risk  

A new study has found that alcohol consumption and cigarette smoking are key causes of bowel cancer.

Lead researcher Rachel Huxley, an associate professor at The George Institute, says that people who consume the largest quantities of alcohol—more than 7 drinks per week—have 60 per cent greater risk of developing the cancer than non-drinkers.

The researcher further said that smoking, obesity and diabetes were also associated with a 20 per cent greater risk of developing bowel cancer—the same risk linked with consuming high intakes of red and processed meat.

Telling about the most startling finding of the study, Huxley said: 'The strong, and largely, unknown association between high intakes of alcoholic beverages with risk of colorectal cancer. Most people probably know that being overweight and having poor dietary habits are risk factors for the disease, but most are probably unaware that other lifestyle risk factors such as alcohol consumption, cigarette smoking and diabetes are also important culprits.'

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• Alcohol, cigarettes cause bowel cancer  

A new global study has shown that people who consume large quantities of alcohol (seven drinks per week) have a 60 per cent greater risk of developing the cancer, compared to others.

Rachel Huxley, professor at The George Institute, who led the study, said the most startling finding was "the strong, and largely, unknown association between high intakes of alcoholic beverages with risk of colorectal (bowel) cancer."

"Most people probably know that being overweight and having poor dietary habits are risk factors for the disease, but most are probably unaware that other lifestyle risk factors such as alcohol consumption, cigarette smoking and diabetes are also important culprits," she added.

Smoking, obesity and diabetes were also associated with a 20 per cent greater risk of developing bowel cancer - the same risk linked with consuming high intake of red and processed meat.

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• Shoveling Up II: The Impact of Substance Abuse on Federal, State and Local Budgets 

NEW CASA REPORT FINDS FEDERAL, STATE AND LOCAL GOVERNMENTS SPEND ALMOST HALF A TRILLION DOLLARS A YEAR ON SUBSTANCE ABUSE AND ADDICTION OF EVERY FEDERAL AND STATE DOLLAR SPENT, 96 CENTS GOES TO SHOVEL UP WRECKAGE OF ILLNESS, CRIME, SOCIAL ILLS; ONLY 2 CENTS GOES TO PREVENTION AND TREATMENT . . .

Substance abuse and addiction cost federal, state and local governments at least $467.7 billion in 2005, according to Shoveling Up II: The Impact of Substance Abuse on Federal, State and Local Budgets, a new 287-page report released today by The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) at Columbia University.

The CASA report found that of $373.9 billion in federal and state spending, 95.6 percent ($357.4 billion) went to shovel up the consequences and human wreckage of substance abuse and addiction; only 1.9 percent went to prevention and treatment, 0.4 percent to research, 1.4 percent to taxation and regulation, and 0.7 percent to interdiction.

The report, based on three years of research and analysis, is the first ever to assess the costs of tobacco, alcohol and illegal and prescription drug abuse to all levels of government. Using the most conservative assumptions, the study concluded that the federal government spent $238.2 billion; states, $135.8 billion; and local governments, $93.8 billion, in 2005

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• Drug Abuse-Related Government Spending Hit $468 Billion, Report Says 

Government spending related to smoking and the abuse of alcohol and illegal drugs reached $468 billion in 2005, accounting for more than one-tenth of combined federal, state and local expenditures for all purposes, according to a new study.

Most abuse-related spending went toward direct health care costs for lung disease, cirrhosis and overdoses, for example, or for law enforcement expenses including incarceration, according to the report released Thursday by the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse . . .

The study is the first to calculate abuse-related spending by all three levels of government.

"This is such a stunning misallocation of resources," said Joseph A. Califano Jr., chairman of the center, referring to the lack of preventive measures. "It's a commentary on the stigma attached to addictions and the failure of governments to make investments in the short run that would pay enormous dividends to taxpayers over time."

Beyond resulting in poor health and crime, addictions and substance abuse -- especially alcohol -- are major underlying factors in other costly social problems like homelessness, domestic violence and child abuse. . . .

The new report cites the antismoking campaigns of the last several decades as a promising model: education, higher taxes and restrictions on smoking zones have cut the incidence of smoking by close to half, saving billions in costs. It called for similar efforts to curb under-age drinking and excess alcohol consumption by adults, using higher taxes on beer, for example.

Even with tobacco, far more could be done, according to the report, which noted that only a small fraction of the more than $200 billion the states have received since 1998 under the Multi-State Tobacco Settlement had gone to prevention of smoking.

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VIDEO: Shaken Not Stirred 

A new spirit that gets inhaled rather than imbibed?

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