Drinkaware respond to alcohol-specific deaths in the UK

Drinkaware's response to the Office for National Statistics alcohol-specific deaths in the UK registered in 2022, published 22 April. These statistics can be found on the Office for National Statistics webpage, here.

Karen Tyrell, CEO of the charity Drinkaware, said:

"These statistics are truly devastating with each one an individual family tragedy. The more than 10,000 deaths are at a record high and six times the number that die on our roads each year.

"Alcohol-specific deaths have been rising sharply since 2019, as we see the impact of increased consumption during the pandemic, and the heavy drinking of baby boomers and Generation X coming to a head. This is coupled with the growing health inequalities in the last ten years further exacerbating these death rates.

“The heart-breaking part is they are preventable. We should heed the British Liver Trust's call for early diagnosis of liver disease, the single biggest factor in many of these deaths, in order to reverse this record rise and start giving people their lives back.

"In addition, we want a step change in our relationship with alcohol. There are more than eight million people that regularly drink above the Chief Medical Officers guidelines and we need to reduce that number. We want to help people understand their drinking through things like our Drinking Check so they can identify if they are putting their health at risk."