Cancer cases on rise in India due to alcohol

According to a study published in The Lancet Oncology journal, alcohol consumption is on the rise in India and it was associated with 62,100 or five per cent of newly diagnosed cancer cases last year.

Shockingly, the researchers found that more than 740,000 or four per cent of new cancer cases in 2020 may be attributed to alcohol drinking around the world.

The study shows that in 2020, there were more than 6.3 million cases of mouth, pharynx, voice box (larynx), oesophageal, colon, rectum, liver, and breast cancer. These cancers have well-established causal links to alcohol consumption, and the estimates of the direct associations with alcohol in the new study are the first of their kind for 2020.

“Trends suggest that although there is a decrease in alcohol consumption per person in many European countries, alcohol use is on the rise in Asian countries such as China and India, and in sub-Saharan Africa,” said Harriet Rumgay of the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), France.

Rumgay added, “In addition, there is evidence that the COVID-19 pandemic has increased rates of drinking in some countries.”