The ripple effects of drinking alcohol

New research into the secondhand effects of alcohol finds that nearly 20% of adults in the U.S. — some 53 million people — are affected adversely because of others’ drinking. These adverse effects include physical harm and other forms of harassment and financial problems. Some 16% of people included in the nearly 9,000-person survey said that they experienced harassment. These circumstances varied depending on gender as well as by age: Women were more likely to experience something negative as a result of someone else’s drinking as were those under the age of 25. The authors write that public health interventions that broadly assess the risk of how alcohol could harm others are needed in order to avoid these ripple effects.