There were 8,416 alcohol-related deaths registered in the UK in 2013, according to figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS). This represented an increase of 49 from the previous year and did not change the overall age-standardised death rate of 14 per 100,000 per population, said ONS, the lowest since 2000.
Death rates were highest among people aged 60-64, with two thirds of the total number of deaths among men. Although Scotland saw the highest death rate, the country was the only one in the UK where the rate was ‘significantly lower than a decade ago’. Statistics also revealed that people in ‘routine occupations tended to have higher death rates and lose more potential years of working life because of alcohol-related deaths than those in more advantaged socio-economic classes’, said ONS.
‘All deaths related to alcohol are avoidable and yet the number losing their lives to alcohol harms is still alarmingly high,’ said Alcohol Concern chief executive Jackie Ballard. ‘This shows just how desperately we need the government to take serious action on alcohol misuse.’ This should include introducing minimum unit pricing, she said, while the government should also ‘ignore the siren voices of the drinks industry calling for a cut in alcohol duty’.
Alcohol-related deaths in the United Kingdom, registered in 2013 at www.ons.gov.uk