What Does Alcohol Abuse Cost Society?
We all pay for alcohol abuse and addiction. Alcohol is the most abused drug in America. More than 100,000 U.S. deaths each year are caused either directly or indirectly by excessive alcohol consumption. Drunk driving, cirrhosis, falls, accidents, cancer, stroke, heart attack — all caused by alcohol — kill at least one person in our society every hour of every day.
In the course of a year, 74% of male drinkers and 72% of female drinkers over the age of 21 drink excessively. Nearly 18 million Americans are alcoholics, alcohol abusers or suffer from an alcohol use disorder; 500,000 of them children between the ages of 9 and 12. At some point in their lives, more than 18% of Americans will abuse or become dependent on alcohol. About one in every five people will have to deal with alcohol abuse during their lifetime. Nearly half of all American families will be impacted by alcohol abuse.
And despite the tragic statistics, many Americans turn a blind eye to the dangers of alcohol. Alcohol is the most commonly used drug among young people. Of kids who’ve used alcohol, 65% get it from friends and family. Alcohol use among high school students is rampant with 50% of seniors admitting to drinking within the past month, 32% of whom said they were drunk at least once. Binge drinking is a problem that affects 1 in every 5 kids age 12 to 20. Kids who drink are more likely to use other drugs, but the real danger is alcohol itself. Alcohol kills 6.5 times more kids than all other illegal drugs combined. Underage drinking costs the U.S. $58 billion per year, enough to buy every public school student a computer.
Every 30 minutes someone is killed by an alcohol-impaired driver — that’s nearly 50 people every day, almost 18,000 people a year. In a 2001 survey, one in every 10 American adults reported driving under the influence of alcohol at least once. Among young adults age 18 to 25, nearly 23% admitted to driving drunk. Traffic crashes are the greatest single cause of death for people aged 6 to 33, and 45% of those fatalities are alcohol-related.
Alcohol is closely related to domestic abuse and sexual violence. Three out of every four incidents of domestic violence involve alcohol abuse. Women whose partners abuse alcohol are 3.6 times more likely to be assaulted by their partners. In 1997, 40% of convicted rape and sexual assault offenders said they were drinking at the time of their crime. In 2002, more than 70,000 college students were victims of alcohol-related sexual assault. An estimated 480,000 children are physically abused each year by a parent or caretaker with an alcohol problem.
Alcohol and alcohol related problems cost America at least $100 million in health care and lost productivity every year.
- 6.6% of employees in full time jobs report heavy drinking.
- 40% of all industrial fatalities and 47% of industrial injuries are linked to alcohol.
- Alcohol abusers spend four times as many days in the hospital as nondrinkers, primarily due to drinking-related injuries.
- Alcohol deepens depression, increasing the risk of suicide. The odds of attempting suicide are twice as great for drinkers as for nondrinkers. Alcoholism is a factor in 30% of all completed suicides. Approximately 7% of alcoholics will die by suicide. Alcohol use plays a role in 75% of adult suicides and 28% of suicides by kids age 9 to 15.
Next time: How to tell if you have an alcohol problem.
