Alcohol Usage as a Possible Explanation for Socio‐economic and Occupational Differentials in Mortality from Hypertension and Coronary Heart Disease in England and Wales*

Abstract

Summary: Alcohol usage as a possible explanation for socio-economic and occupational differentials in mortality from hypertension and coronary heart disease in England and Wales. In England and Wales in 1949-53, those socio-economic and occupational groups with high death rates for cirrhosis also had high death rates for hypertension and stroke. Alcohol exposure appeared to be the factor common to the 15 occupational groups with the highest death rates for cirrhosis. Although deaths certified to hypertension and stroke were relatively more frequent in these “high cirrhosis” occupations, deaths from coronary heart disease (CHD) were decreased relative to deaths from all causes. These observations suggest that although alcohol use is associated with an increased risk of hypertension, there may be a lesser increase in the risk of CHD. These observations could be of causal significance; if so, a study of the effects of alcohol should help dissociate those causal mechanisms unique to hypertension from those unique to CHD.