HepaHealth II: Preventing liver disease with policy measures to tackle alcohol consumption and obesity

Chronic liver disease (CLD) causes 1.8% of all deaths in Europe. Without policies to mitigate harmful alcohol consumption and obesity, that proportion will continue to increase. This major study, commissioned by EASL and supported by an unrestricted education grant from Bristol-Myers Squibb and Gilead, was carried out over the past 3 years and estimates the impact of policy interventions targeting alcohol and obesity on the incidence of CLD and primary liver cancer in France, the Netherlands, and Romania. The project builds on our previous work published in 2018.

Our peer-reviewed microsimulation model was employed to project trends in alcohol consumption and body mass index (BMI) from 2022 to 2030. We modelled the incidence of CLD and liver cancer under three policy scenarios versus an inaction scenario. All policies had an important impact ranging from a 2% to 7% reduction in annual incidence of CLD and liver cancer by 2030. The most effective scenarios are an increased Minimum Unit Pricing (MUP) of €1 on alcohol or introducing a set of complementary public health policies targeting an increased MUP, a sugar sweetened beverage (SSB) tax, and a volumetric tax that target both alcohol consumption and obesity.

View the poster presented at the EASL Congress in Vienna (June 2023)

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