Distilled Spirits Overconsumption as the Most Important Factor of Excessive Adult Male Mortality in Europe.

AIMS: To explain comprehensively variations in adult male mortality rate in Europe, and in particular, high mortality in some East European countries with particular focus on specific patterns of alcohol consumption. SHORT SUMMARY: Per capita distilled spirits consumption is found to be the strongest determinant of the adult male mortality rate in Europe as soon as the unrecorded alcohol consumption is taken into account. It turns out to be much stronger than the other tested significant determinants such as per capita health expenditures, smoking prevalence, consumption of hard drugs and per capita consumption of vegetables and fruit. METHODS: Ordinary least squares (OLS) multiple regression with adult male mortality rate as a dependent variable, and various indicators of alcohol and drug consumption as well as logarithm of gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, logarithm of total per capita health expenditures, latitude (climatic factors), per capita fruit and vegetable consumption, smoking prevalence as independent factors. RESULTS: Per capita distilled spirits consumption turns out to be the strongest determinant of the adult male mortality rate in Europe as soon as the unrecorded alcohol consumption is taken into account. It turns out to be much stronger than the other tested significant determinants of the adult male mortality rate such as per capita health expenditures, smoking prevalence, consumption of hard drugs and per capita consumption of vegetables and fruit. Still, higher per capita wine consumption has turned out to be a marginally significant determinant of the higher adult male mortality rate in some tests. Latitude, beer and soft drug consumption have turned out insignificant in this study. CONCLUSIONS: Spirits consumption is a major risk factor of adult male mortality, with significantly greater impact compared to beer and wine. Therefore, reduction in distilled spirits consumption in hard liquor drinking areas should be a major target in health policy.

Evolution of stability of socioeconomic system functioning: Some approaches to modeling (with an application to the case of Egypt, 2011-2013).

This paper proposes a methodological approach to analyzing the evolution of the stability of socioeconomic systems and to assessing the risk of their possible destabilization based on the use of mathematical modeling methods. In this paper, a basic model is presented allowing us to describe the joint dynamics of processes in the economic, organizational, and sociopsychological areas of society. The model shows at what parameters of the socioeconomic system its steady functioning is possible, and at which it is impossible. It is shown that the transition from its steady state to an unsteady one is not smooth but occurs as a leap. This methodology is applied to the analysis of stability and change in the Egyptian socioeconomic system after 2010.