NEW YORK – Researchers have tied 19 novel genetic risk variants to problematic drinking in a new genome-wide meta-analysis.
While a number of risk variants have previously been linked to alcohol use disorder and problematic drinking, researchers led by Yale School of Medicine's Joel Gelernter conducted a meta-analysis of more than 435,000 individuals to search for additional risk loci. Alcohol use is a leading risk factor for death, leading to 2.8 million deaths in 2016, according to a Global Burden of Disease Study.