EXCESSIVE drinking is killing people in Britain faster than anywhere else in Europe as the country’s alcohol consumption continues to soar, according to research.

A study of cases of cirrhosis of the liver, a frequently fatal condition commonly caused by alcohol abuse, has found that deaths have risen sharply in Britain while falling in other European countries.

In the 1980s and 1990s, cirrhosis death rates for men more than doubled in Scotland, and rose by more than two thirds in England and Wales.

The number of women dying increased by almost a half in both regions over the same period. The figures were compared with those for 12 other European countries: Austria, Finland, Germany, Ireland, Italy, France, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and Denmark.

Although some still had high rates, these countries had experienced declines of between a fifth and a third since the early 1970s. Total recorded alcohol consumption doubled in Britain between 1960 and 2002. In contrast, alcohol has become less popular in the mainly wine-drinking countries of southern Europe, driving the overall reduction in cirrhosis deaths on the Continent.

The findings, published in The Lancet, will prompt further scrutiny of the Government’s approach to drinking. It has been accused of fuelling a binge-drinking epidemic by failing to educate people on the dangers of drinking and easing licensing regulations. New laws came in at the end of last year allowing bars, pubs and clubs in England and Wales to serve alcohol around the clock. So far the change has not produced the explosion in drunkenness that critics predicted.

Robin Room, of the Centre for Social Research on Drugs and Alcohol at the University of Stockholm, said that while types of beverage and patterns of drinking might affect the risk of developing cirrhosis, the sheer volume of alcohol consumed played a primary role.

“The UK Government has turned a determined blind eye to the problem and has failed to make the reduction of the population’s alcohol intake a policy goal,” Professor Room said in an article accompanying the study. “Through the new alcohol licensing law and the official guidance on it, the national Government has also done its best to tie the hand of local government on this issue.”

Cirrhosis occurs when normal tissue becomes replaced by fibrous material similar to scar tissue. Although liver cirrhosis can be triggered by viral infections such as hepatitis B or C, the chief culprit in developed countries is alcohol abuse.

David Leon, of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and Jim McCambridge, of King’s College London, analysed information from a World Health Organisation database listing deaths from different causes for the study. In the 1950s, England and Wales had the lowest rates of liver cirrhosis death in Western Europe. For men the figure was 3.4 per 100,000 per year, and for women, 2.2.

Scotland had higher rates — 8.2 and 6.1 respectively — but its record was still low in comparison with some other countries. But the investigators found that cirrhosis death rates throughout Britain accelerated sharply in the 1980s and 1990s.

By 2001 they stood at 14.1 for men and 7.7 for women in England and Wales. In Scotland the situation was much worse, with rates of 34.4 deaths per 100,000 per year for men and 16.1 for women.

Don Shenker, of the charity Alcohol Concern, said that the study highlighted how successive governments had failed to tackle one of the country’s most deadly health problems.

“Excessive drinking kills about 22,000 people every year. That is why it is so shameful that for those drinkers who need help, fewer than one in ten get the help they require.”

POISONOUS EFFECTS OF ALCOHOL

About 10 per cent of heavy drinkers eventually develop cirrhosis

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