Annoyingly, there doesn't seem to be any information about why this is happening. It's somewhat hard to believe that people are actually drinking a lot more than they did 10/20/30/40 years ago.
One life tip to be aware of: Acetaminophen (Tylenol) is horribly toxic when combined with alcohol. Don't do it.
The huge increases in the non-alcoholic variety of this disease (fittingly named non-alcoholic fatty liver disease) is a big contributor. The two diseases are closely related, with very similar histologic and enzymatic features, and having one makes the liver more vulnerable to the other, likely in equal measure.
The prevailing theories of pathogenesis of fatty liver disease (the "two-hit" or "multiple hit" hypotheses, or whatever) include fat accumulation in the liver as the first step toward liver disease. This first step can be achieved by heavy drinking or insulin resistance and obesity. Once that's in place, subsequent insults can take the liver down the path to alcoholic or non-alcoholic liver disease, or both.
Thank you for the links. Only the last seems to speak to the statistic I'm interested in, which is per capita consumption changes over time.
In short, it sounds like change for the US is rather small, and actually negative for Europe. Given that, once might theorize that more people are drinking heavily, etc. (which might be covered in these links, but I haven't looked closely yet)
Here's part of the last page:
At the global level, the team found that the total volume of alcohol consumed per year increased by as much as 70% between 1990 and 2017, from 20,999 million liters per year to 35,676 million liters per year.
“Before 1990, most alcohol was consumed in high-income countries, with the highest use levels recorded in Europe. However, this pattern has changed substantially, with large reductions across Eastern Europe and vast increases in several middle-income countries, such as China, India, and Vietnam,” explains Manthey.
Moreover, he adds, “This trend is forecast to continue up to 2030, when Europe is no longer predicted to have the highest level of alcohol use.”
In Europe, alcohol consumption — among adults, per capita, per year — decreased by 12%, from 11.2 liters to 9.8 liters between 2010 and 2017. The same figure increased by 34% in Southeast Asian countries, from 3.5 liters to 4.7 liters.
Over the same time period, alcohol consumption saw a small increase, from 9.3 liters to 9.8 liters, in the United States, and from 7.1 liters to 7.4 liters in China, though it decreased in the United Kingdom, from 12.3 liters to 11.4 liters.
The researchers also observe that in most of the countries that they studied, the volume of alcohol consumed seemed to increase at a faster rate than the number of drinkers, suggesting that the average volume of alcohol intake per individual is set to rise.
More specifically, alcohol consumption per capita is likely to increase from 5.9 liters of pure alcohol per year in 1990 to 7.6 liters in 2030.
The article says people's bodies vary greatly in their ability to handle alcohol without harm. And it also says that harm to the liver often shows no symptoms until so much damage has been done that it's too late.
So does that mean the rational course is to just not consume alcohol at all, or at least stay at very low levels, like a single drink a week?
I'm going to have to disagree, not because you're wrong but because you've gone full Sith(Never state an absolute). Alcohol is probably required for some vital chemical pathways in the body. Just because something is dangerous doesn't mean our body doesn't need it and has ways to mitigate the damage similar to how our bodies handle reactive oxygen species.
Nearly 2 billion of world population adheres to a religion that expressly prohibits alcohol consumption, and I'm sure a very good amount out of that makes it to a ripe old age.
Sure, but that wouldn't disprove the notion that alcohol might have some benefit.
There is evidence that ethanol enhances the liver's ability to properly manage its fat stores, and thus might be protective against steatosis [1]. But this is controversial, and it seems that experts are largely unwilling to endorse alcohol consumption in the presence of any liver problems [2].
Fair. I drank for 20yrs and clung on every last article about x drinks beneficial, how reservatol helps, etc., but at end of day I'm skeptical of who shadow funded what. We live in a consumption nation where our GDP is driven by that. I was in denial about drinking and knew it made me feel like crap. Quitting drinking was epic.
I’m not sure what you mean by “ok.” Probably any amount has negative health consequences. But people have other interests besides maximizing longevity, and that’s perfectly ok as far as I’m concerned.
One life tip to be aware of: Acetaminophen (Tylenol) is horribly toxic when combined with alcohol. Don't do it.