This is a series of blogs addressing the dangers of alcohol use and abuse. There is no doubt that alcohol use, even if you are not a serious alcoholic, effects your body adversely. Alcohol increases your chances of contracting more than 200 diseases.
Here is a fact about alcohol - about 5% of all cancer is due to alcohol consumption. As reported in www.news.com.au.
Let’s make no bones about it: alcohol is a class one carcinogen, as listed by the World Health Organization.
Effect on Families
But the affect alcohol can have on an individual’s health is only part of the story. In 2012, the Salvation Army commissioned research as part of Alcohol Awareness week into the effect alcohol abuse has on families. Among many worrisome findings, they revealed that 4.2 million Australians know families where they think children are not being properly cared for because of someone’s alcohol use. The situation is worse in other countries, especially Eastern Europe.
Add this to the fact that almost half of all domestic homicides are alcohol related, and that the proportion of people experiencing physical abuse by someone under the influence of alcohol increased from 1.5 million in 2010 to 1.7 million in 2013, and you’ve got yourself a worrying epidemic. And this is Australia, the land where there are "no worries, mate."
The next entry in this series will take a personal look at people's lives who were negatively impacted by alcohol.