One year into the Covid-19 pandemic, alcohol-related deaths accounted for a full 3% of all U.S. deaths, compared with 2.8% in 2019. That’s in a context where alcohol-related deaths had already doubled between 1999 and 2017.
25%
Increase in all alcohol-related deaths between 2019 and 2020—from 78,927 people to 99,017 people. That compares with an 18.8% rise in deaths from all causes during the same time period.
39.7%
Increase in deaths with an underlying cause of alcohol-related mental and behavioral disorders between 2019 and 2020. Meanwhile, deaths from alcohol-related liver diseases rose 22.4%.
35.1%
Increase in alcohol-related deaths between 2019 and 2020 for people ages 35–44. That’s the largest increase among all age groups, followed by 37% for those ages 25–34.
40.8%
Increase in opioid overdose deaths between 2019 and 2020 that involved alcohol as a contributing cause. That percentage rose to 59.2% for overdose deaths specifically related to synthetic opioids other than methadone.
