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. 2020 Oct-Dec;13(4):499-509.
doi: 10.25122/jml-2020-0079.

Prevalence of Alcohol and Tobacco Use in India and Implications for COVID-19 - Niyantrita Madhumeha Bharata Study Projections

Madhava Sai Sivapuram  1 , Raghuram Nagarathna  2 , Akshay Anand  3 , Suchitra Patil  2 , Amit Singh  2 , Hongasandra Ramarao Nagendra  2
Affiliations

Prevalence of Alcohol and Tobacco Use in India and Implications for COVID-19 - Niyantrita Madhumeha Bharata Study Projections

Madhava Sai Sivapuram et al. J Med Life. 2020 Oct-Dec.

Abstract

Abuse of legal substances in India includes alcohol and tobacco, which are the major risk factors for various non-communicable diseases and deaths. The current pandemic has identified tobacco consumption as a risk factor for COVID-19, highlighting the need to control substance abuse. The objective of this study was to estimate the prevalence of substance abuse in India and discuss the cost-effective public health strategies (such as yoga) to alleviate COVID-related anxiety in order to prevent substance abuse and its associated co-morbidities such as type 2 diabetes mellitus. This study reports the data on tobacco and alcohol abuse from a nationwide randomized two-arm diabetes control trial (Niyantrita Madhumeha Bharata, 2017) conducted by the Indian Yoga Association (IYA) through Swami Vivekananda Yoga Anusandhana Samsthana (S-VYASA), Bengaluru. Data of 30,354 participants who abuse tobacco and 30,159 participants who abuse alcohol were collected all over India. The prevalence is estimated at around 8.7% for alcohol abuse and 7.9% for tobacco abuse, Arunachal Pradesh state ranking the highest regarding both alcohol and tobacco abuse, while the Tripura state ranked the lowest. School and college-based mandatory yoga programs need to be implemented to prevent the increase of substance abuse in India to alleviate the psychosocial stress of adolescents and college-going students, besides the installation of the mindfulness-based diabetes yoga protocol (DYP) in the wellness centers of Ayushman Bharat.

Keywords: Legal substance abuse; Niyantrita Madhumeha Bharata; alcohol; diabetic yoga protocol; tobacco.

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Figures

Figure 1:
Figure 1:
Different zones of India.
Figure 2:
Figure 2:
The number of participants from the door-to-door survey.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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