Drinking alcohol increased the possibility of self-rated poor health and mortality risk among middle-aged and seniors: a longitudinal study conducted in China

There has been lack of studies that investigate the causal impact of alcohol consumption on health and mortality in middle-aged and older populations in China. This cohort study aims to investigate whether alcohol use increases poor health and mortality risk in middle-aged and older Chinese population. The study is a cohort study design that was based on the China Health and Retired Longitudinal study (CHARLS). Measures of poor health and alcohol use are self-rated poor/very poor and alcohol use. Competing Cox proportional hazard regression model (CPHM) was used to model the data and the hazards ratio (HR) of poor health, mortality for current and former drinkers versus nondrinkers and current drinkers versus former drinkers was estimated using CPHM after adjusting for deign-effects and covariates. This study found significantly increased risk of all-cause mortality among current (adjusted HR = 1.54 and P = 0.0423) and former drinkers (Adjusted HR = 1.52 and P = 0.0096) compared to lifetime nondrinkers among middle-aged and senior Chinese people; significantly increased hazard of poor health among current drinkers (Adjusted HR = 1.26 and P = 0.0443) compared with lifetime nondrinkers. The hazards of all-cause mortality and self-rated poor health increased with the amount and frequency of alcohol drinking, and drinking years. This study found that either former or current drinkers self-rated having a poor health and had a significantly increased risk of all-cause mortality compared with nondrinkers. Heavy drinkers had poor health status and higher risk of mortality compared with those who drank light or moderate amount of alcohol in middle-aged and senior Chinese population.