COVID Impacts on Alcohol Use in Communities Affected by Repeated Disasters

摘要/摘要 过度饮酒是美国的一个主要问题，特别是在沿海地区 墨西哥湾周围的社区，那里近四分之一的居民筛查呈阳性 因为误用酒精。与新冠肺炎疫情相关的压力源和相关应对策略 (例如，居家订单、关闭学校和企业)可能增加了酒精滥用 特别是对于那些受大流行和失业影响不成比例的人，如种族/族裔 少数族裔和女性。本提案涉及NOT-AA-20中描述的NIAAA优先事项。 011，帮助做好新冠肺炎等突发公共卫生事件的前期准备工作。我们计划 检验脆弱的墨西哥湾沿岸酒精消费变化的模式和预测因素 在大流行期间，包括随着疫苗和新变种的出现以及 失业现象依然存在。在灾难研究中，前瞻性研究很少，但拟议的研究 将通过从现有人口中收集两波新的调查数据来解决这一差距 自2016年以来，我们一直在关注2520名墨西哥湾沿岸居民的代表性队列 海湾地区社区的创伤、恢复能力和机会调查(强)。新的 这项工作将建立在广泛的关于精神健康、酗酒、就业等基线数据的基础上 历史、灾难暴露和社会资源。拟议的工作还建立在我们团队的 酒精滥用纵向研究的产品线，包括研究 个人和社区层面的风险因素之间的相互作用，压力和创伤的作用， 心理健康症状和对风险和灾难的心理社会反应在 墨西哥湾沿岸地区。新冠肺炎独有的两个因素是失业率的大幅上升和 居家订单引起的越来越多的孤独感，这两者都可能改变人们的 饮酒行为。通过两个新的调查浪潮，我们将：估计变化的幅度 新冠肺炎发作后的饮酒频率和数量；检查 个体内酒精滥用的变化轨迹；识别新冠肺炎之前的预测因素 变化模式(例如，人口统计特征、累积创伤暴露、共同发生 精神健康症状)；并确定与新冠肺炎相关的损失(即失业、 孤独感)预测随着时间的推移酒精使用的变化。现有数据和新数据将可通过 通用答复者标识符并进行地理编码，为公众提供唯一的资源 健康研究和回应。这项研究的结果可能会显著推动科学 墨西哥湾沿岸弱势居民的知识和临床实践。

Summary/Abstract Excessive drinking is a major problem in the United States, particularly among coastal communities surrounding the Gulf of Mexico, where nearly one in four residents screen positive for alcohol misuse. Stressors related to the COVID-19 pandemic and associated response policies (e.g., stay-at-home orders, closure of schools and businesses) may have increased alcohol misuse particularly for those disproportionately affected by the pandemic and job loss, like racial/ethnic minorities and women. This proposal addresses the NIAAA priorities described in NOT-AA-20- 011, helping to lay groundwork for public health emergencies such as COVID-19. We plan to examine patterns and predictors of change in alcohol consumption in vulnerable Gulf Coast communities over the course of the pandemic, including as vaccines and new variants emerge and unemployment persists. Prospective studies are rare in disaster research, but the proposed study will address this gap by collecting two new waves of survey data from an existing, population representative cohort of 2,520 Gulf Coast residents we have been following since 2016 via the Survey of Trauma, Resilience, and Opportunity in Neighborhoods in the Gulf (STRONG). The new work will build on extensive baseline data about mental health, alcohol misuse, employment history, disaster exposure, and social resources. The proposed work also builds on our team's productive line of longitudinal studies of alcohol misuse, including studies examining interactions between individual- and community-level risk factors, the role of stress and trauma, co-occurrence of mental health symptoms, and psychosocial reactions to risks and disasters in the Gulf Coast region. Two factors unique to COVID-19 are massive increases in unemployment and growing feelings of loneliness caused by stay-at-home orders, both of which might change people's drinking behavior. Through two new survey waves we will: estimate the magnitude of changes in frequency and quantity of alcohol consumption following the onset of COVID-19; examine trajectories of change in alcohol misuse within individuals; identify pre-COVID-19 predictors of patterns of change (e.g., demographic characteristics, cumulative trauma exposure, co-occurring mental health symptoms); and determine whether COVID-19-related losses (i.e., unemployment, loneliness) predict change in alcohol use over time. Existing and new data will be mergeable via a common respondent identifiers and also be geocoded, providing a unique resource for public health research and response. Results from this study could significantly advance scientific knowledge and clinical practice for vulnerable Gulf Coast residents.