According to the World Health Organization, alcohol consumption contributes to 3 million deaths each year globally and is responsible for 7.1% and 2.2% of the global burden of disease for males and females. While previous studies have indicated that a link exists between socioeconomic status and alcohol use, it remains relatively unknown how social class impacts the future risk of alcohol-related conditions such as alcoholic liver disease.
In the present study, researchers analyzed longitudinal data from over 2.3 million individuals from Swedish national registries to understand more about the link between socioeconomic status and alcohol-related medical conditions. To estimate socioeconomic status, the researchers included data on income and education level.
Ultimately, they found that lower income levels and lower educational attainment were linked to a higher risk of alcohol-related medical conditions in both men and women. The results remained after adjusting for factors such as marital status, history of psychiatric illness, and genetic predisposition to alcohol abuse.
“Among individuals with an alcohol use disorder, those with lower levels of education or lower incomes are at higher risk for developing an alcohol-related medical condition, such as cirrhosis or alcoholic cardiomyopathy. Additional screening and prevention efforts may be warranted to reduce health disparities,” noted the authors in a press release.
The researchers acknowledged some limitations to their findings. These, they wrote, include 'the possibility of false negatives for psychiatric illness registrations, changes in income after age 40 that were not accounted for due to modeling restrictions, restriction to residents of a high-income country, and the inability to account for individual-level alcohol consumption using registry data.'
Sources: Science Daily, PLOS Medicine
