Title
Impact of Public Health Policies on Alcohol-Associated Liver Disease in Latin America: An Ecological Multinational Study
Date Issued
01 November 2021
Access level
metadata only access
Resource Type
journal article
Author(s)
Díaz L.A.
Idalsoaga F.
Fuentes-López E.
Márquez-Lomas A.
Ramírez C.A.
Roblero J.P.
Araujo R.C.
Higuera-de-la-Tijera F.
Toro L.G.
Pazmiño G.
Hernandez N.
Mendizabal M.
Corsi O.
Ferreccio C.
Lazo M.
Brahmania M.
Singal A.K.
Bataller R.
Arrese M.
Arab J.P.
Publisher(s)
John Wiley and Sons Inc
Wolters Kluwer Health
Abstract
Background and Aims: Alcohol-associated liver disease (ALD) is the leading cause of liver-related mortality in Latin America, yet the impact of public health policies (PHP) on liver disease is unknown. We aimed to assess the association between alcohol PHP and deaths due to ALD in Latin American countries. Approach and Results: We performed an ecological multinational study including 20 countries in Latin America (628,466,088 inhabitants). We obtained country-level sociodemographic information from the World Bank Open Data source. Alcohol-related PHP data for countries were obtained from the World Health Organization Global Information System of Alcohol and Health. We constructed generalized linear models to assess the association between the number of PHP (in 2010) and health outcomes (in 2016). In Latin America, the prevalence of obesity was 27% and 26.1% among male and female populations, respectively. The estimated alcohol per capita consumption among the population at 15 years old or older was 6.8 L of pure alcohol (5.6 recorded and 1.2 unrecorded). The overall prevalence of alcohol use disorders (AUD) was 4.9%. ALD was the main cause of cirrhosis in 64.7% of male and 40.0% of female populations. A total of 19 (95%) countries have at least one alcohol-related PHP on alcohol. The most frequent PHP were limiting drinking age (95%), tax regulations (90%), drunk-driving policies and countermeasures (90%), and government monitoring systems and community support (90%). A higher number of PHP was associated with a lower ALD mortality (PR, 0.76; 95% CI, 0.61-0.93; P = 0.009), lower AUD prevalence (PR, 0.80; 95% CI, 0.65-0.99; P = 0.045), and lower alcohol-attributable road traffic deaths (PR, 0.81; 95% CI, 0.65-1.00; P = 0.051). Conclusions: Our study indicates that in Latin America, countries with higher number of PHP have lower mortality due to ALD, lower prevalence of AUD, and lower alcohol-attributable road traffic mortality.
Start page
2478
End page
2490
Volume
74
Issue
5
Language
English
OCDE Knowledge area
Salud pública, Salud ambiental
Scopus EID
2-s2.0-85113170262
PubMed ID
Source
Hepatology
ISSN of the container
0270-9139
Sponsor(s)
Partially supported by the Chilean government through the Fondo Nacional de Desarrollo Científico y Tecnológico (FONDECYT 1200227 to J.P.A.) and the Comisión Nacional de Investigación Científica y Tecnológica (CONICYT, AFB170005, CARE Chile UC to J.P.A.).
Sources of information:
Directorio de Producción Científica
Scopus