A drink equals how many cigarettes? Equating mortality risks from alcohol and tobacco use in Canada.

Objective: To quantify and communicate risk equivalencies for alcohol-and tobacco-attributable mortality by comparing per standard drinks consumed to per number of cigarettes smoked in Canada. Methods: Alcohol-and tobacco-attributable premature deaths (≤75 years of age) and years of life lost (YLL) were estimated using a lifetime risk modeling approach. Alcohol-attributable death statistics were obtained from the 2023 Canadian Guidance on Alcohol and Health data source. Tobacco-attributable death statistics were derived from the Mortality Population Risk Tool (MPoRT) model. Results: The risk of alcohol use on premature death and YLL increased non-linearly with the number of drinks consumed, while the risk for tobacco use on these two measures increased linearly with the number of cigarettes smoked. Males who consumed 5 drinks/day-a standard drink contains 13.45 grams of alcohol in Canada-had an equivalent risk as smoking 4.9 cigarettes/day (when modeling for premature death) and 5.1 cigarettes/day (when modeling for YLL). Females who consumed 5 drinks/day experienced an equivalent risk as smoking 4.2 cigarettes/day for premature deaths and YLL. At all levels of alcohol consumption females and males who consumed <5 drinks/day have less risks from consuming a standard drink than from smoking a cigarette. For males who consumed 5 drinks/day, the increased risks of death from per drink consumed and per cigarette smoked were equal. Conclusion: Risk equivalencies comparing alcohol use to tobacco use could help people who drink improve their knowledge and understanding of the mortality risks associated with increased number of drinks consumed per day.

Distributions of alcohol use and alcohol-caused death and disability in Canada: Defining alcohol harm density functions and new perspectives on the prevention paradox.

AIMS: The aims of this study were to examine the distribution of alcohol use and to define 'harm density functions' representing distributions of alcohol-caused health harm in Canada, by sex, towards better understanding which groups of drinkers experience the highest aggregate harms. DESIGN: This was an epidemiological modeling study using survey and administrative data on alcohol exposure, death and disability and risk relationships from epidemiological meta-analyses. SETTING: This work took place in Canada, 2019. PARTICIPANTS: Canadians aged 15 years or older participated. MEASUREMENTS: Measures included modeled life-time mean daily alcohol use in grams of pure alcohol (ethanol) per day, alcohol-caused deaths and alcohol-caused disability-adjusted life-years. FINDINGS: As a life-time average, more than half of Canadians aged 15+ (62.8% females, 46.9% males) use fewer than 10 g of pure alcohol per day (g/day). By volume, the top 10% of the population consume 45.9% of the total ethanol among males and 47.1% of the total ethanol among females. The remaining 90% of the population experience a slim majority of alcohol-caused deaths (males 55.3%, females 46.9%). Alcohol harm density functions compose the size of the using population and the risk experienced at each volume level to show that the population-level harm experienced is highest for males at 25 g/day and females at 13 g/day. CONCLUSIONS: Almost 50% of alcohol use in Canada is concentrated among the highest 10% of drinkers, but more than half of the alcohol-caused deaths in Canada in 2019 were experienced by the bottom 90% of the population by average volume, providing evidence for the prevention paradox. New alcohol harm density functions provide insight into the aggregate health harm experienced across the mean alcohol use spectrum and may therefore be used to help determine where alcohol policies should be targeted for highest efficacy.

The public-private decision for alcohol retail systems: Examining the economic, health, and social impacts of alternative systems in Finland.

Background: Organising alcohol retail systems with more or less public ownership has implications for health and the economy. The aim of the present study was to estimate the economic, health, and social impacts of alcohol use in Finland in 2018 (baseline), and in two alternative scenarios in which current partial public ownership of alcohol retail sales is either increased or fully privatised. Methods: Baseline alcohol-attributable harms and costs were estimated across five categories of death, disability, and criminal justice. Two alternate alcohol retail systems were defined as privately owned stores selling: (1) only low strength alcoholic beverages (public ownership scenario, similar to Sweden); or (2) all beverages (private ownership scenario). Policy analyses were conducted to estimate changes in alcohol use per capita. Health and economic impacts were modelled using administrative data and epidemiological modelling. Results: In Finland in 2018, alcohol use was estimated to be responsible for €1.51 billion (95% Uncertainty Estimates: €1.43 billion, €1.58 billion) in social cost, 3,846 deaths, and 270,652 criminal justice events. In the public ownership scenario, it was estimated that alcohol use would decline by 15.8% (11.8%, 19.7%) and social cost by €384.3 million (€189.5 million, €559.2 million). Full privatisation was associated with an increase in alcohol use of 9.0% (6.2%, 11.8%) and an increase in social cost of €289.7 million (€140.8 million, €439.5 million). Conclusion: The outcome from applying a novel analytical approach suggests that more public ownership of the alcohol retail system may lead to significant decreases in alcohol-caused death, disability, crime, and social costs. Conversely, full privatisation of the ownership model would lead to increased harm and costs.

What proportion of the price of a typical alcoholic beverage is taxation in Canada and why does it matter? / Quelle est la part des taxes dans le prix d'une boisson alcoolisée type au Canada et pourquoi est-ce important?

INTRODUCTION: Canadian distillers and brewers have claimed that between 50% and 80% of the price of alcoholic drinks are government taxes. These claims were made in campaigns to decrease alcohol taxation. METHODS: We investigated these claims using publicly available Statistics Canada data and provincial-level product sales data and breakdowns of the prices of typical alcohol beverages in major market sectors. RESULTS: In all cases, the rate of total sales tax and excise taxation are mostly between 20% and 30% of final retail prices, well below the industry claims.

The Potential Health Impact of an Alcohol Minimum Unit Price in Québec: An Application of the International Model of Alcohol Harms and Policies.

OBJECTIVE: Alcohol minimum unit pricing is a strategy capable of reducing alcohol-related harm from cheap alcoholic beverages. We used the International Model of Alcohol Harms and Policies (InterMAHP), an open-access alcohol harms estimator and policy scenario modeler, to estimate the potential health benefits of introducing minimum unit pricing in Québec, Canada. METHOD: Aggregated mortality and hospitalization data were obtained from official administrative sources. Alcohol sales and pricing data were obtained from the partial government retail monopoly and Nielsen. Exposure data were from the Canadian Substance Use Exposure Database. Average price changes under two minimum-unit-pricing scenarios were estimated by applying a product-level pricing analysis. The online InterMAHP tool was used to automate the estimation of observed alcohol-attributable harm and what was projected in each policy scenario. RESULTS: Alcohol was estimated to cause 2,850 deaths and 24,694 hospitalizations in Québec in 2014. Introducing minimum unit pricing of CAD$1.50 was estimated to reduce consumption by 4.4%, alcohol-attributable deaths by 5.9% (95% CI [0.2%, 11.7%]), and alcohol-attributable hospital stays by 8.4% (95% CI [3.2%, 13.7%]). Higher minimum unit pricing of CAD$1.75 was estimated to reduce alcohol-attributable deaths by 11.5% (95% CI [5.9%, 17.2%]) and alcohol-attributable hospital stays by 16.3% (95% CI [11.2%, 21.4%]). CONCLUSIONS: The results of this policy modeling study suggest that the introduction of minimum unit pricing between CAD$1.50 and $1.75 would substantially reduce the alcohol-caused burden of disease in Québec. The quantification of alcohol-caused death and disability, and the changes in these measures under two scenarios, was significantly automated by the open-access resource, InterMAHP.

How many alcohol-attributable deaths and hospital admissions could be prevented by alternative pricing and taxation policies? Modelling impacts on alcohol consumption, revenues and related harms in Canada. / Réduction des décès et des hospitalisations dus à l'alcool grâce à des politiques fiscales et d'établissement des prix différentes? Modélisation des effets sur la consommation d'alcool, les revenus et les méfaits liés à l'alcool au Canada.

INTRODUCTION: In 2017, Canada increased alcohol excise taxes for the first time in over three decades. In this article, we describe a model to estimate various effects of additional tax and price policies that are predicted to improve health outcomes. METHODS: We obtained alcohol sales and taxation data for 2016/17 for all Canadian jurisdictions from Statistics Canada and product-level sales data for British Columbia. We modelled effects of alternative price and tax policies - revenue-neutral taxes, inflation-adjusted taxes and minimum unit prices (MUPs) - on consumption, revenues and harms. We used published price elasticities to estimate impacts on consumption and revenue and the International Model for Alcohol Harms and Policies (InterMAHP) to estimate impacts on alcohol-attributable mortality and morbidity. RESULTS: Other things being equal, revenue-neutral alcohol volumetric taxes (AVT) would have minimal influence on overall alcohol consumption and related harms. Inflation-adjusted AVT would result in 3.83% less consumption, 329 fewer deaths and 3762 fewer hospital admissions. A MUP of $1.75 per standard drink (equal to 17.05mL ethanol) would have reduced consumption by 8.68% in 2016, which in turn would have reduced the number of deaths by 732 and the number of hospitalizations by 8329 that year. Indexing alcohol excise taxes between 1991/92 and 2016/17 would have resulted in the federal government gaining approximately $10.97 billion. We estimated this could have prevented 4000-5400 deaths and 43 000-56 000 hospitalizations. CONCLUSION: Improved public health outcomes would be made possible by (1) increasing alcohol excise tax rates across all beverages to compensate for past failures to index rates, and (2) setting a MUP of at least $1.75 per standard drink. While reducing alcohol-caused harms, these tax policies would have the added benefit of increasing federal government revenues.

Does Drinking Within Low-Risk Guidelines Prevent Harm? Implications for High-Income Countries Using the International Model of Alcohol Harms and Policies.

OBJECTIVE: Many countries propose low-risk drinking guidelines (LRDGs) to mitigate alcohol-related harms. North American LRDGs are high by international standards. We applied the International Model of Alcohol Harms and Policies (InterMAHP) to quantify the alcohol-caused harms experienced by those drinking within and above these guidelines. We customized a recent Global Burden of Disease (GBD) analysis to inform guidelines in high-income countries. METHOD: Record-level death and hospital stay data for Canada were accessed. Alcohol exposure data were from the Canadian Substance Use Exposure Database. InterMAHP was used to estimate alcohol-attributable deaths and hospital stays experienced by people drinking within LRDGs, people drinking above LRDGs, and former drinkers. GBD relative risk functions were acquired and weighted by the distribution of Canadian mortality. RESULTS: More men (18%) than women (7%) drank above weekly guidelines. Adherence to guidelines did not eliminate alcohol-caused harm: those drinking within guidelines nonetheless experienced 140 more deaths and 3,663 more hospital stays than if they had chosen to abstain from alcohol. A weighted relative risk analysis found that, for both women and men, the risk was lowest at a consumption level of 10 g per day. For all levels of consumption, men were found to experience a higher weighted relative risk than women. CONCLUSIONS: Drinkers following weekly LRDGs are not insulated from harm. Greater than 50% of alcohol-caused cancer deaths are experienced by those drinking within weekly limits. Findings suggest that guidelines of around one drink per day may be appropriate for high-income countries.

The International Model of Alcohol Harms and Policies: A New Method for Estimating Alcohol Health Harms With Application to Alcohol-Attributable Mortality in Canada.

OBJECTIVE: Data regarding alcohol-caused health harms are required by policymakers for setting health priorities. However, these estimations are currently resource intensive, and estimates vary substantially by method. Thus, many countries, states, and regions do not track these harms. We address this limitation through creation of the International Model of Alcohol Harms and Policies (InterMAHP), an open-access alcohol harms estimator. InterMAHP consists of methodologies and program software designed to assist alcohol research teams in estimating alcohol-attributable mortality and morbidity, by region. It is available at www.intermahp.cisur.ca. Application is illustrated through updated estimates of alcohol-attributable mortality in Canada. METHOD: Mortality counts and per capita alcohol sales were obtained from Statistics Canada. Drinking and bingeing prevalences were obtained from the Canadian Substance Use Exposure Database. InterMAHP automated the calculations of alcohol-attributable fractions (AAF) using the modern AAF formulation and a gamma distribution to specify the continuous prevalence distribution of consumption. RESULTS: Alcohol is a leading driver of mortality in Canada. In 2016, more than 14,800 (95% CI [12,435, 17,127]) deaths were alcohol attributable, representing 5.5% of all deaths. This burden is borne disproportionately by men (79%). Among condition categories, cancer is the leading cause of alcohol-attributable mortality in both men and women. CONCLUSIONS: InterMAHP has the potential to assist public health researchers globally in estimating alcohol harms. This open-access software was used to estimate alcohol-attributable mortality in Canada, which was shown to be substantial. Policies proven to reduce alcohol consumption and related harms should be considered to reduce this burden.

Expanding attributable fraction applications to outcomes wholly attributable to a risk factor.

The problem central to this document is the estimation of change in disease attributable to an epidemiological exposure variable that stems from a change in the distribution of that variable. We require that both disease and exposure are quantifiable as real numbers, and then ask how to estimate the fraction of disease attributable to exposure, producing the general attributable fraction methodology. After the mathematical framework is in place, we explore the implications of a disease that is wholly attributable to a given risk factor, demonstrate why standard applications of the attributable fractions do not extend, and present general methodological considerations for this case. Finally, we demonstrate the methodology using the example of alcoholic psychoses.

Implications of Cardioprotective Assumptions for National Drinking Guidelines and Alcohol Harm Monitoring Systems.

The existence and potential level of cardioprotection from alcohol use is contested in alcohol studies. Assumptions regarding the risk relationship between alcohol use and ischaemic heart disease (IHD) are critical when providing advice for national drinking guidelines and for designing alcohol harm monitoring systems. We use three meta-analyses regarding alcohol use and IHD risk to investigate how varying assumptions lead to differential estimates of alcohol-attributable (AA) deaths and weighted relative risk (RR) functions, in Australia and Canada. Alcohol exposure and mortality data were acquired from administrative sources and AA fractions were calculated using the International Model of Alcohol Harms and Policies. We then customized a recent Global Burden of Disease (GBD) analysis to inform drinking guidelines internationally. Australians drink slightly more than Canadians, per person, but are also more likely to identify as lifetime abstainers. Cardioprotective scenarios resulted in substantial differences in estimates of net AA deaths in Australia (between 2933 and 4570) and Canada (between 5179 and 8024), using GBD risk functions for all other alcohol-related conditions. Country-specific weighted RR functions were analyzed to provide advice toward drinking guidelines: Minimum risk was achieved at or below alcohol use levels of 10 g/day ethanol, depending on scenario. Consumption levels resulting in 'no added' risk from drinking were found to be between 10 and 15 g/day, by country, gender, and scenario. These recommendations are lower than current guidelines in Australia, Canada, and some other high-income countries: These guidelines may be in need of downward revision.