Beverage-specific alcohol sales and violent mortality in Russia
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.20882/adicciones.172Keywords:
beverage-specific alcohol sales, violent mortality, ARIMA timeseries analysis, RussiaAbstract
Background: High violent mortality rate in Russia and its profound fluctuation over recent decades have attracted considerable interest. A mounting body of evidence points to the binge drinking pattern as a potentially important contributor to the violent mortality crisis in Russia. In line with this evidence, we assume that higher level of vodka consumption in conjunction with binge drinking pattern results in close aggregate-level association between vodka sales and violent mortality rates in Russia. Aims and Methods: To test this hypothesis, trends in beverage-specific alcohol sales per capita and mortality rates from external causes in Russia between 1980 and 2005 were analyzed by means of ARIMA time-series analysis. Results: Results of the analysis indicate that violent mortality rates tend to be more responsive to change in vodka sales per capita than to change in total level of alcohol sales. The analysis suggests that a 1-litre increase in vodka sales per capita would result in a 5% increase in violent mortality rate, an 11.3% increase in accidents and injuries mortality rate, a 9.2% increase in suicide rate, a 12.5% increase in homicide rate, and a 21.9% increase in fatal alcohol poisoning rate. Conclusion: The outcomes of this study provide support for the hypothesis that alcohol played a crucial role in the fluctuation in violent mortality rate in Russia in recent decades. Assuming that drinking vodka is usually associated with intoxication episodes, these findings provide additional evidence that the binge drinking pattern is an important determinant of the violent mortality crisis in Russia.References
Box, G.E.P. & Jenkins, G.M. (1976). Time Series Analysis: forecasting
and control. London. Holden-Day Inc.
Bye, E.K. (2008). Alcohol and homicide in Eastern Europe. Homicide
Studies, 12, 7-28.
Gavrilova, N.S., Semyonova, V.G., Evdokushkina, G.N. & Gavrilov, L.A.
(2000). The response of violent mortality to economic crisis in Russia. Population Research and Policy Review, 19, 397–419.
Landberg, J. (2008). Alcohol and suicide in Eastern Europe. Drug and
Alcohol Review, 27: 361–373.
Landberg, J. (2010). Population drinking and fatal injuries in Eastern
Europe: a time-series analysis of six countries. European Addiction Research, 16, 43–52.
Leon, D.A., Chenet, L., Shkolnikov, V.M., Zakharov, S., Shapiro, J.,
Rakhmanova, G., Vassin, S. & McKee M. (1997). Huge variation in Russian mortality rates 1984-94: artefact, alcohol, or what? Lancet, 350, 383–88.
Leon, D.A., Saburova, L., Tomkins, S., Andreev, E., Kiyanov, N., McKee,
M. & Shkolnikov, V.M. (2007). Hazardous alcohol drinking and premature mortality in Russia: a population based case-control study. Lancet, 369, 2001–2009.
Leon, D.A. & Shkolnikov, V.M. (1998). Social stress and the Russian
mortality crisis. Journal of the American Medical Association, 79, 790–791.
Lester, D. (1998). Suicide and homicide after the fall of communist regimes. European Psychiatry, 13, 98–100.
Moskalewicz, J., Razvodovsky, Y. & Wieczorek, P. (2009). East-West
disparities in alcohol-related harm within European Union. Paper presented at the KBS Annual Conference, Copenhagen, 1-5 June, 2009.
Nemtsov, A.V. & Razvodovsky, Y.E. (2008). Alcohol situation in Russia,
-2005. Social and Clinical Psychiatry, 2, 52–60.
Nemtsov, A.V. (2000). Estimates of total alcohol consumption in Russia, 1980-1994. Drug and Alcohol Dependence, 58, 133–142.
Nemtsov, A.V. (2002). Alcohol-related human losses in Russia in the
s and 1990s. Addiction, 97, 1413–1425.
Nilssen, O., Averina, M., Brenn, T., Brox, J., Kalinin, A. & Archipovski,
V. (2005). Alcohol consumption and its relation to risk factors for cardiovascular disease in the north-west of Russia: the Archangelsk study. International Journal of Epidemiology, 34, 781–788.
Norström, T. & Ramstedt, M. (2005). Mortality and population drinking: a review of the literature. Drug and Alcohol Review, 24, 537–547.
Norström, T. & Rossov, I. (1999). Beverage-specific effects on suicide.
Nordic Studies of Alcohol and Drugs, 16, 109–18.
Norström, T. & Skog, O.J. (2001). Alcohol and mortality: methodological
and analytical issues in aggregate analysis, Addiction, 96, 5–17.
Pridemore, W.A. & Chamlin, M.B. (2006). A time-series analysis of the
impact of heavy drinking on homicide and suicide mortality in Russia, 1956-2002. Addiction, 101(12), 1719–1729.
Razvodovsky, Y.E. (2000). Structure and dynamics of alcohol-related
mortality in Belarus. Alcoholism, 36, 35-43.
Razvodovsky, Y.E. (2001). The association between the level of vodka
consumption per capita and violent mortality rate: results of time-series analysis. Adicciones, 13(Suppl. 1), 77–92.
Razvodovsky, Y.E. (2003). Alcohol and mortality crisis in Belarus. Grodno. Medical University Press.
Rehm, J., Sulkowska, U., Manczuk, M., Boffeta, P., Powles, J., Popova, S.
& Zatonski, W. (2007). Alcohol accounts for a high proportion of premature mortality in central and Eastern Europe. International Journal of Epidemiology, 36, 458–67.
Rehm, J., Taylor, B., Patra, J. (2006). Volume of alcohol consumption,
pattern of drinking and burden of disease in the European region. Addiction, 101, 1086–95.
Skog, O.J. (2001). Alcohol consumption and overall accident mortality
in 14 European countries. Addiction, 96(Supplement 1), 35–47.
Stickley, A., Leinsalu, M., Andreew, E., Razvodovsky, Y.E., Vagero, D. &
McKee, M. (2007). Alcohol poisoning in Russia and the countries in the European part of the former Soviet Union, 1970-2002. European Journal of Public Health, 17, 444–449.
Stickley, A., Razvodovsky, Y. & McKee, M. (2009). Alcohol mortality in
Russia: A historical perspective. Public Health, 123, 20–26.
Wasserman, D. & Varnik, A. (1998). Reliability of statistics on violent
death and suicide in the former USSR, 1970-1990. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, 394(Supplement), 34–41.
Zaridze, D., Maximovitch, D., Lazarev, A., Igitov, V., Boroda, A., Boreham,
J., Boyle, P., Peto, R. & Boffetta, P. (2008). Alcohol poisoning is a main determinant of recent mortality trends in Russia: evidence from a detailed analysis of mortality statistics and autopsies. International Journal of Epidemiology, 38, 143–153.
