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Excessive alcohol use led to approximately 88,000 deaths and 2.5 million years of potential life lost (YPLL) each year in the United States from 2006 – 2010, sh

Excessive alcohol use led to approximately 88,000 deaths and 2.5 million years of potential life lost (YPLL) each year in the United States from 2006 – 2010, shortening the lives of those who died by an average of 30 years. Further, excessive drinking was responsible for 1 in 10 deaths among working-age adults aged 20-64 years. The economic costs of excessive alcohol consumption in 2010 were estimated at $249 billion, or $2.05 a drink. So alcohol causes 10x the amount of deaths per year, and when you factor in economic damages caused by people operating machinery, driving, hurting themselves when drunk it seems like heroin abuse is neither a "much more fatal problem" nor a much more widespread problem than alcoholism. Faster growing, yes. http://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/fact-sheets/alcohol-use.htm http://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/fact-sheets/alcohol-use.htm

6stringmerc 11y ago
Care to balance out the statistics of the alcohol deaths with the number of people in the United States who use alcohol? I did a quick search and came up with this via the NIH: In 2013, 86.8 percent of people ages 18 or older reported that they drank alcohol at some point in their lifetime; 70.7 percent reported that they drank in the past year; 56.4 percent reported that they drank in the past month... In 2013, 24.6 percent of people ages 18 or older reported that they engaged in binge drinking in the past month ...and, via the 2010 US Census, there are 193,000,000 people between the ages of 18 and 64. So, if we consider the math, many, many more people consume alcohol than heroin, and as such, 88,000 is a much smaller "fatal problem" than you frame it. So, not as widespread as alcoholism, but much more fatal for those affected. I stand by my assertion that there's no need to "over-state" the heroin problem in the US.

6stringmerc 11y ago

Care to balance out the statistics of the alcohol deaths with the number of people in the United States who use alcohol? I did a quick search and came up with this via the NIH: In 2013, 86.8 percent of people ages 18 or older reported that they drank alcohol at some point in their lifetime; 70.7 percent reported that they drank in the past year; 56.4 percent reported that they drank in the past month... In 2013, 24.6 percent of people ages 18 or older reported that they engaged in binge drinking in the past month ...and, via the 2010 US Census, there are 193,000,000 people between the ages of 18 and 64. So, if we consider the math, many, many more people consume alcohol than heroin, and as such, 88,000 is a much smaller "fatal problem" than you frame it. So, not as widespread as alcoholism, but much more fatal for those affected. I stand by my assertion that there's no need to "over-state" the heroin problem in the US.