Alcoholism: A Serious Disease

I recommend to anyone who wants to better understand alcoholism to read the book Under the Influence. Alcoholism is a serious, deadly disease that’s often overlooked when talking about consequences of drug use. Alcohol is a drug, just a socially accepted drug. Just because alcohol is socially accepted, legal and harmless to most who drink it doesn’t mean it’s harmless to those who develop alcoholism, or to those who abuse alcohol and make bad decisions.

The World Health Organization recently reported that alcohol is responsible for 5% all deaths worldwide — around 3 million people a year. Almost every family has someone affected by alcoholism, or they know someone close. Hospital emergency rooms are filled with the consequences of alcoholism or alcohol abuse. The old idea was that people just need to learn how to drink responsibly. A person susceptible to alcoholism can’t drink responsibly, not for long at least. For the alcoholic, drinking gets out of control, then the person tries to control it, then it gets out of control, back and forth, until it progresses to mostly out of control drinking, dependence and withdrawals when the person is not drinking.

It pays to learn the facts about alcoholism. The myths about alcoholism will continue to kill people. Recently, the mental health field changed how we refer to this problem — Alcohol Use Disorder is the new terminology they use. The thing is, no matter what you call it, the facts remain the same, as does the deaths caused by alcohol.