Americans love their alcohol — sometimes to death.
Alcohol-related deaths have doubled in the U.S. in the last two decades, and that number is thought to be undercounted, since death certificates often fail to capture the role alcohol plays in a death, according to CNN.
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The group with the highest increase in alcohol-related deaths was non-Hispanic white women. The CNN report said about 70% of the adult population reported drinking an average of over two drinks a day in 2017, which is considered to be in the “heavy drinker" category.
When it comes to addictions of any kind, be it drinking, drugs, eating, gambling or something else, there is one reason why people find themselves in an addiction cycle — the search for pleasure.
The good feeling you get in response to drugs, food, sex and other stimulants is driven by the release of various neurotransmitters throughout your brain, including dopamine, the so-called “pleasure chemical.”
Addiction also affects your frontal cortex, impairing your ability to control impatience, impulsivity, irritability and other moods that accompany addiction and withdrawal.
It’s true that some people — particularly those who suffered abuse, neglect or other trauma as children are more likely to have an addiction.
Approximately 88,000 Americans die every year due to alcohol poisoning.
In general, women are more likely to succumb to alcohol poisoning and feel the effects of alcohol faster than men of the same size. They’re also more prone to suffer from long-term alcohol-induced damage in the body.
Alcohol poisoning impairs the body and eventually shuts down the areas of the brain that control basic life-support functions like breathing, heart rate and temperature control.
You become more susceptible to alcohol poisoning when you binge drink (four or more alcoholic drinks at one sitting), drink heavily (consume eight or more alcoholic drinks a week for women or 15 or more for men), drink during pregnancy or drink under the age of 21.
Alcohol poisoning can seriously impact your health. Some common signs of alcohol poisoning include loss of coordination, cold hands and bluish skin (hypothermia), vomiting repeatedly and/or uncontrollably, irregular or slowed breathing, seizures, confusion, unconsciousness, stupor (conscious but unresponsive) and sometimes coma. Seek immediate medical attention if you or someone you know has signs of alcohol poisoning.
The 2015 to 2020 U.S. Standard Dietary Guidelines for Americans classify moderate drinking as no more than one drink per day for women and no more than two drinks per day for men.
Maybe you’ve read where an occasional glass of red wine may benefit your health. Whether that’s true or not — and reports are conflicting — too much wine of any kind, even red, is unhealthy.
More than 66 million Americans — nearly 25% of the total adolescent and adult population — reported binge drinking at some point in 2015. Excessive alcohol use costs the U.S. $249 billion a year.
Even if you consider yourself a moderate drinker, you may be causing significant harm to your health, including increased liver stiffness, systemic inflammation and leaky gut.
Exercise may lessen some risks of alcohol. Chronic drinkers who exercise five hours a week have the same rate of mortality as those who never drink alcohol, in part by counteracting the inflammation caused by alcohol.