Alcohol-related deaths have been increasing during the past two decades, and particularly in recent years. However, most studies focus only on deaths that are fully caused by alcohol use and do not also consider causes of deaths that are partially caused by alcohol use, such as injuries, motor vehicle crashes, certain types of cancer, and heart disease. This presentation will describe the most recent data available on deaths from excessive alcohol use in the United States using a comprehensive measure that accounts for 58 causes of alcohol-related deaths, as well as trends in these deaths. It will also discuss resources on effective strategies for reducing excessive drinking and alcohol-related harms, including deaths, to promote improved health and well-being.
Dr. Marissa Esser is the Lead of the Alcohol Program at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion. She has been working in the alcohol and public health field for more than a decade. In her current role, she oversees projects on the surveillance of excessive alcohol use and its impact on states and communities and applied alcohol epidemiology studies. She and her team also develop communications about excessive alcohol use and effectively preventing it and create resources that help to translate research on effective population-level alcohol strategies into practice. Dr. Esser participates on several national interagency working groups to advance efforts to reduce alcohol-related harm. She holds a PhD from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and an MPH from Emory University.