Prevent Disease.com - Tobacco, Alcohol, Drugs Kill 7 Million a Year--Study



		Tobacco, Alcohol, Drugs Kill 7 Million a Year--Study CANBERRA (Reuters) - Tobacco, alcohol and illicit drugs prematurely kill about seven million people worldwide each year and the number is rising, according to a study released in Australia on Tuesday. Professor Juergen Rehm, director of Switzerland's Addiction Research Institute, said in the Australian capital Canberra the global burden of disease resulting from smoking, drinking and taking drugs was huge. "One reason for this is increased worldwide exposure to these substances, especially in the highly populated emerging economies of Southeast Asia and China," Rehm told Reuters before presenting his study to an international drug-research symposium in Perth. "Another is that the relative share of diseases associated with substance abuse, such as chronic disease, accidents and injuries, as well as HIV and hepatitis, are predicted to increase." Rehm said tobacco, alcohol and illicit drugs were responsible for about 8.9% of the total global burden of disease in the year 2000, with his study building on some research he conducted for the World Health Organization last year. He said tobacco was the number one killer addiction in 2000, responsible for 4.9 million deaths or 71% of the total drug-related deaths--a jump of more than one million since 1990. The rise was most marked in developing nations although most smoking-related diseases were found in industrialized countries. About 1.8 million deaths were attributable to the use of alcohol, about 26% of all drug-related deaths, with the proportion greatest in the Americas and Europe. Russia's alcohol problem was particularly pronounced. Illicit drugs caused about 223,000 deaths, or 3% of all drug-related deaths. "The most surprising finding from this research is that alcohol has become the number one risk factor in developing countries with emerging economies like China and Thailand over the past decade, above tobacco," Rehm said. Rehm hoped his research could be used by governments to formulate policies to combat the preventable deaths and disease. Reference Source 89 For more information on how to prevent other diseases, use PreventDisease.com's "Quick Prevention Resources".