Peacock, Amy and Leung, Janni and Larney, Sarah and Colledge, Samantha and Hickman, Matthew and Rehm, Jürgen and Giovino, Gary A and West, Robert and Hall, Wayne and Griffiths, Paul and Ali, Robert and Gowing, Linda and Marsden, John and Ferrari, Alize J and Grebely, Jason and Farrell, Michael and Degenhardt, Louisa (2018) Global statistics on alcohol, tobacco and illicit drug use: 2017 status report. Addiction, 113, (10), https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/add.14234.
External website: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/ad...
AIMS: This review provides an up-to-date curated source of information on alcohol, tobacco, and illicit drug use and their associated mortality and burden of disease. Limitations in the data are also discussed, including how these can be addressed in the future.
METHODS: Online data sources were identified through expert review. Data were mainly obtained from the World Health Organization, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, and Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation.
RESULTS: In 2015, the estimated prevalence among the adult population was 18.3% for heavy episodic alcohol use (in the past 30 days); 15.2% for daily tobacco smoking; and 3.8%, 0.77%, 0.37%, and 0.35% for past-year cannabis, amphetamine, opioid, and cocaine use, respectively. European regions had the highest prevalence of heavy episodic alcohol use and daily tobacco use. The age-standardised prevalence of alcohol dependence was 843.2 per 100,000 people; for cannabis, opioids, amphetamines and cocaine dependence it was 259.3, 220.4, 86.0 and 52.5 per 100,000 people, respectively. High-Income North America region had among the highest rates of cannabis, opioid, and cocaine dependence. Attributable disability-adjusted life-years (DALYs) were highest for tobacco (170.9 million DALYs), followed by alcohol (85.0 million) and illicit drugs (27.8 million). Substance-attributable mortality rates were highest for tobacco (110.7 deaths per 100,000 people), followed by alcohol and illicit drugs (33.0, and 6.9 deaths per 100,000 people, respectively). Attributable age-standardised mortality rates and DALYs for alcohol and illicit drugs were highest in Eastern Europe; attributable age-standardised tobacco mortality rates and DALYs were highest in Oceania.
CONCLUSIONS: In 2015 alcohol and tobacco use between them cost the human population more than a quarter of a billion disability-adjusted life years, with illicit drugs costing a further tens of millions. Europeans proportionately suffered more but in absolute terms the mortality rate was greatest in low and middle income countries with large populations and where the quality of data was more limited. Better standardised and rigorous methods for data collection, collation and reporting are needed to assess more accurately the geographical and temporal trends in substance use and its disease burden.
A Substance use and dependence > Effects or consequences
B Substances > Cannabis / Marijuana
B Substances > Alcohol
B Substances > Tobacco (cigarette smoking)
B Substances > Sedatives, hypnotics or tranquillisers (CNS depressants)
B Substances > CNS stimulants
B Substances > Cocaine
B Substances > Opioids (opiates)
B Substances > New (novel) psychoactive substances
G Health and disease > State of health
P Demography, epidemiology, and history > Population dynamics > Substance related mortality / death
VA Geographic area > International
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