Alcohol is the most dangerous substance. CC by gfpeck/Flickr

Alcohol, not heroin or crack cocaine, is the biggest risk of all well-liked substances, a recent study has found. Other popular drugs ranked as a lot more lethal, however alcohol’s effects on society as a whole put it at the top of the list. The study, which evaluated 20 popular drugs for their detrimental effects on users and the individuals around them, ranked “hard” substances for instance ecstasy at the bottom of the list. You should take alcohol in moderation especially if you feel like asking yourself, is mental illness hereditary?

A lot more harmful than all drugs is alcohol

The cost of alcohol to society makes it probably the most dangerous drug being abused in the U.K., based on a study published in the British medical journal Lancet. Based on CNN, there were many drugs looked at by experts. The social, psychological and physical difficulties caused by the substances were all studied. A scoring system created to evaluate the degree of danger gave alcohol 72 out of a possible 100 points. The second and 3rd place substances were heroin and crack cocaine. They only got 55 and 54 points. Only five points went to mushrooms, seven to Lysergic acid diethylamide, ecstasy with nine, and marijuana scored 20.

 

Why is alcohol more dangerous than crack cocaine and narcotics?

 

Booze is the most damaging drug to society, before narcotics and crack because it’s the most abused drug and is legal and available in society. There were probably the most harmful substances depicted by the study also. Methamphetamine, crack cocaine and heroin were all listed. Dependence, injury and mortality were just some of the nine factors used to determine how damaging the drug was. Things like crime, economic cost and environmental harm were considered too. These were some of six factors about harm caused to others. BBC News spoke to co-author David Nutt who said that many will go to “extraordinary lengths” to abuse alcoholic beverages and thousands in Britain are addicted to it.

 

Just what alcohol does

 

17.6 million adults are alcoholics, the National Institutes of Health tells us. Many drinkers do not know it is a problem considering it is legal and socially acceptable, Dr. Jeffery Parsons, an addiction expert, told the New York Daily News. Unless you get arrested for drunk driving, it is entirely legal to drink which is why it is easy for many to abuse the drug and still feel like they’re following all the rules.