NIH study found alcohol-related deaths increased by 25% in the US during the COVID-19 pandemic

Alcohol-related deaths in the US skyrocketed during the COVID-19 pandemic as pandemic stressors led to an increase in substance abuse that will have a long-term impact on the nation.

Researchers from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), found that alcohol-related deaths increased by 25% in the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic.

While the pandemic has caused an increase in all kinds of substance abuse in America, social isolation and treatment cuts have made it easy for some to spiral into it.

There was also considerable certainty in the number of drug overdose deaths, another worrying trend that emerged during last year’s pandemic.

“Deaths involving alcohol reflect the hidden cost of the pandemic,” the researchers wrote.

“Drinking more, changing alcohol policies, and reduced access to treatment to cope with epidemic-related stressors are possible contributing factors.”

Publishing their findings Friday in JAMA for the study, the researchers gathered data from the National Center for Health Statistics, part of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The NIH team collected data on deaths from 2019 through the first half of 2021 and compared monthly and annual death rates from alcohol-related causes.

Any death directly caused by alcohol – from a cause such as liver poisoning – or where alcohol is a contributing cause – a person who dies in an accident while intoxicated – is classified as alcohol-related.

A total of 78,927 deaths related to alcohol were recorded in 2019. There were occasional month-to-month fluctuations, and all were between 6,000 and 7,000.

Even before the COVID-19 pandemic officially began in March 2020, alcohol-related deaths were already on the rise that year.

In January 2020, more than 7,000 alcohol-related deaths occurred in the United States, a sharp increase since January 2019, two months before the virus truly took over American lives.

The number of deaths from alcoholism began to rise rapidly after the February decline that occurred last year.

In 2020, 99,017 deaths from alcohol were recorded, a 25% increase over the previous year.

Increase in alcohol-related deaths due to pandemic stress factors and discontinuation of addiction treatment (archive photo)

One of the most brutal months of the pandemic to date, December was also the month with the most deaths of the year, with over 9,000 deaths.

Alcohol isn’t the only addiction driving an increase in American deaths during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The United States recorded 105,752 deaths between September 2020 and 2021, the latest data from the CDC.

The figure is a 16% increase over the same period last year, an increase attributed to treatment cuts and social isolation caused by the virus.

Experts warn that there is no guarantee that this problem will resolve itself once the pandemic is over.

They wrote that it is necessary to consider whether alcohol-related deaths will decrease as the pandemic subsides, and whether policy changes can help reduce these deaths.

They also noted that other studies have found reports of an increase in the need for liver transplants due to alcoholism, an increase in cases of alcohol withdrawal, and people using alcohol to cope with the stress caused by the pandemic.