Deaths caused by alcohol use have been climbing in the United States for nearly 20 years, but rose dramatically at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.
According to data released Friday by the Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, alcohol-related deaths increased by 26% from 2019 to 2020, rising from 10.4 deaths for 100,000 people in 2019 to 13 for every 100,000 people in 2020.
“What’s a word bigger than crisis? What was already a crisis, has exploded,” Marvin Ventrell, chief executive officer of the National Association of Addiction Treatment Providers, said to CNN.
