WHO: Over 3.3 Million Deaths Associated with Alcohol in 2012

On Monday the World Health Organization released a new report that documented worldwide alcohol consumption, including facts about alcohol dependency, diseases caused by alcohol, and alcohol-related deaths.

In 2012, over 3.3 million deaths resulted from harmful alcohol use. The WHO report, "Global status report on alcohol and health 2014," documented alcohol consumption in the 194 WHO Member States and calls on the governments to do more to prevent alcohol-related deaths.

On average, the report found that every person in the world aged 15 years or older drinks an average of 6.2 liters of alcohol per year, and the "alcohol-consuming population" (38.3% of the world) consumes an average 17 liters (per person) of alcohol annually.

"We found that worldwide about 16% of drinkers engage in heavy episodic drinking - often referred to as 'binge-drinking' - which is the most harmful to health," said Dr. Shekhar Saxena, Director for Mental Health and Substance Abuse at WHO, in a news release. "Lower-income groups are more affected by the social and health consequences of alcohol. They often lack quality health care and are less protected by functional family or community networks."

Not too surprisingly, Europe had the highest consumption of alcohol per capita, compared to Africa and the Americas, which had stable rates over the past five years. Southeast Asia and the Western Pacific regions revealed an increase in alcohol consumption rates. Because the report found no decreasing rates in any region as a whole, they've suggested some measures for governments to take in order to see improvements.

The protection measures include: increasing taxes on alcohol; raising the drinking age; and regulating the marketing of alcoholic beverages. Although these are fairly self-explanatory measures, many countries are likely hesitant to implement them because alcohol is an inelastic good and generates a lot of money.

At the end of the day, it's most likely going to be up to the everyday person to control their alcohol consumption in order to witness decreasing rates throughout the world.

You can read more about the WHO report here.