Rise in liver deaths

A study by doctors in the Midlands shows that the number of deaths from liver disease has more than doubled in the past decade - largely because of alcohol abuse. Asian men are disproportionately represented among the dead. The researchers, from the Dudley Group of Hospitals, suspect poor diet has also increased susceptibility to liver disease. Figures suggest that drug abuse in the 70s and 80s is to blame for a nationwide rise in alcoholic liver disease. Advanced liver failure carries a poor prognosis, and its prevalence may be reflected by mortality statistics in the form of death certifications for liver disease. Mortality from primary liver disease increased from 6.0 per 100,000 population in 1993 to 12.7 per 100,000 in 2000. The increase was due to the result of alcoholic liver disease that increased almost threefold in about seven years. Rates of increase in deaths from alcoholic liver disease were similar for white men, white women, and Asian men. Asian men had a mortality ratio 3.79 times that of white men. Eighty per cent of the Asian men were judged to be of Sikh religion. After alcoholic liver disease, the largest cause of death was 'unspecified' liver disease, with an annual incidence of 2.5 per 100,000 population. Annual mortality from other defined liver diseases was about 0.5 per 100,000. Hence deaths from alcoholic liver disease has increased in the West Midlands in the past decade, which is also a nationwide trend. The increasing prevalence of alcoholic liver disease has also been seen from the data on increasing admission rates for patients with alcoholic liver disease to hospital. It is believed that this apparent increase might be the result of increasing alcohol consumption, but available evidence did not show any notable increase in the total national alcohol consumption in the past decade nor in the number of people drinking heavily. The type of alcoholic drink consumed and dietary or other (such as genetic or unidentified environmental) factors may therefore be implicated. The increasing prevalence of alcoholic liver disease among Asians may also be contributing. These data have important implications for public health and hospital physicians. The stopping or reversal of the trend in deaths from alcoholic liver disease that has been described requires further public emphasis on the risk of fatal liver disease from excessive alcohol consumption.