Alcohol-related hospital stays fall during Covid pandemic

The rate of alcohol-related hospital stays in the first year of the Covid pandemic was down 10% on the previous 12 months, figures show.

However, Public Health Scotland said the fall in numbers between April 2020 and the end of March 2021 could have been affected by Covid measures.

Admission to hospital was tightly restricted during many months.

Official stats on alcohol deaths, released last year, showed 2020 had the highest number in a decade.

The National Records of Scotland statistics showed there were 1,190 alcohol-specific deaths registered in Scotland in 2020, 170 more than the previous year.

The latest PHS figures on alcohol-related hospital admissions showed a rate of 614 per 100,000 of the population in 2020/21, down 10% on the 681 the previous year.

Background
Recent data suggest that the COVID-19 pandemic and associated restrictions may have influenced alcohol use and promoted addictive behavior. We aimed to investigate the impact of the pandemic on acute alcohol intoxication (AAI) in France.

Methods
We identified all hospital stays related to alcohol abuse in 2018–2020. Differences in number of hospitalizations between 2019 and 2020 were tested using Poisson regressions. Differences between observed and expected deliveries of drugs used in alcohol dependence in 2020 were also studied.

Results
There was a decrease in the number of hospitalizations for AAI between 2019 and 2020 (−9677[−11