Alcohol-related hospital admissions have continued to rise in England, although rates for under 18 admissions have fallen sharply since 2006. See the PHE press release or the statistical reports.
The majority of alcohol-related hospital measures show rises, despite a general pattern of falling alcohol consumption since 2004. However previous decades of rising consumption lead to a 'lag effect' for many related long term health conditions, whilst falls in young people's drinking appears to show more immediate impacts on hospital figures. PHE report a 41% fall in alcohol-related hospital admissions for under-18s since 2006. However between 2002 and 2007 they increased by 32%, according to an Alcohol Concern report.
Alongside under 18's admissions, unintentional injury conditions and chronic liver disease mortality also fell on last year. However the majority of alcohol-related indicators continued to rise including alcoholic liver disease, mental and behavioural disorders and related cardiovascular disease. Alcohol related mortality rates remained stable.
Remember the headlines?
Announcement of the new figures no longer appear to generate significant media attention following changes to the reporting of the data. Total alcohol-related admissions for England reached over one million in 2009/10 with subsequent annual releases generating mass media coverage. However last year a change of focus to a new 'narrow' measure of alcohol-related admissions has seen admissions data announced as part of the Local Alcohol Profiles for England (LAPE) updates.
As such, total alcohol-related hospital admissions for adults in England only appear as a rate per 100,000 population for the 'old' broad measure (where the primary or any secondary reason for admission relates to alcohol). With this rate at now its highest, total adult admissions under the broad measure are likely to total around 1.25 million, nearly double the 644,700 recorded for 2004/05.
Under the new headline narrow measure, a small 1.3% rise on last year takes the figure to 333,000. In fact a fall was shown in the previous year (2012/13) for the narrow measure, indicating a much smaller trend rise over the recent decade.
PHE say the last year's rise was most significant amongst women - a 2.1% increase whilst only up 0.7% for men. PHE also highlight large regional variations with rates in the most deprived areas 55% higher than the least deprived.
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