WHO Expresses Global Concern Over Alcohol-Related Violence
Studies show that alcohol may be a contributing factor in a large percentage of violent crimes. The problem is not one isolated to the United States, the World Health Organization (WHO) released a bulletin regarding the issue as far back as 2010. According to the bulletin, the British Government was seeing “soaring rates of alcohol-related violence” just five years after relaxing some alcohol licensing laws.
Binge drinking among young people was a huge problem in the United Kingdom and across the globe. At the time, the United Kingdom had passed laws allowing 24-hour drinking in certain areas. As noted in the bulletin, in one year “there were almost one million violent crimes that were alcohol-related.” Alcohol-related crimes, at the time, were costing British citizens billions of pounds each year. The new government was then looking at ways to reduce binge drinking amongst young people by issuing fines to establishments that sold to underage kids and banning stores from selling “below-cost” alcohol.
The WHO acknowledges that alcohol-related violence is a “visible problem” in high-income countries but also greatly affects developing countries where there are far fewer regulations on the sale or manufacturing of alcohol. Developing countries are also less likely to collect reliable data on alcohol-related violence. The full scope of the problem, on a global level, may be unknown.
Tragically, the WHO estimates that alcohol may contribute to the death of as many as 2.5 million people each year, including hundreds of thousands of young people. Studies show that alcohol may be involved in “one quarter of all homicides globally.”
In the past decade, the problem has not been eliminated. In many cases, alcohol intake has increased causing concern around the world.