Opportunities for Alcohol-Related Care in the COVID-19 Pandemic and Beyond

Excerpt

Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, it became clear that COVID-19, by disrupting health care and wider social structures, disproportionately impacted individuals with unhealthy substance use.¹ Individuals with unhealthy substance use were at greater risk for COVID-19 infection and poorer outcomes for biologic reasons, including poorer respiratory health, immune changes, and clustering of comorbid illnesses among individuals with substance use disorders. Socio-structural drivers were also at play: individuals with unhealthy substance use may have encountered greater impediments to accessing COVID-19 prevention and care, physical distancing may have been more challenging, and the stressors of lockdown regulations, job loss, remote education for children, family loss, and isolation may themselves have driven more substance use, in a vicious cycle. …