Alcohol-linked deaths a problem for the Americas

By Elizabeth DeVita-Raebrun NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Liver disease and brain disorders due to alcohol abuse are important causes of premature death in the Americas, a new study concludes. “This provides direct evidence of the impact of alcohol on the health of countries in the region,” said one of the study’s authors, Dr. Vilma Pinheiro Gawryszewski, an advisor on health information and analysis for the Pan American Health Organization(PAHO). In the 16 North, Central, and South American countries studied, alcohol was the sole cause of 79,456 deaths a year, the researchers say. That represented 1.4 percent of deaths from all causes, and alcohol-related liver disease alone accounted for 0.6 percent of all-cause mortality.