Alcohol-related cirrhosis of the liver has more than doubled among 25 to 34-year-olds in the past ten years.

Figures for England, given in a parliamentary answer to the Liberal Democrats, show a rise from 270 cases in 1996-97 to 642 in 2005-06.

Overall, cirrhosis cases have almost tripled over the period, rising from just under 7,000 a year to more than 19,000. It generally takes a decade or more of hard drinking to damage the liver sufficiently to develop cirrhosis.

Alcohol is by no means the only cause of cirrhosis, but the data given to Sandra Gidley, the Liberal Democrat health spokeswoman, cover only cases related to alcohol. She said: “Ministers should have woken up to this issue and taken action years ago.

Professor Ian Gilmore, president of the Royal College of Physicians, said that doctors were seeing patients with end-stage cirrhosis of the liver in their 20s, and he expected the pattern to increase.

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