Researchers have found that obesity and alcohol act together to increase the risk of liver disease in both men and women.

From a public health perspective, strategies to jointly reduce both excessive alcohol consumption and excessive body weight should lead to a reduction in the incidence of liver disease, two studies published on bmj. com concluded.

Examination of the link between body mass index (BMI) and liver cirrhosis in 1.2 million middle-aged UK women as part of the Million Women Study was seen by the first study, conducted by University of Oxford researchers.

Risks were adjusted for factors such as age, alcohol consumption, smoking, socioeconomic status and physical activity for the participants who were followed for an average of 6.2 years.

Women who were overweight or obese had an increased relative risk of liver cirrhosis as compared to women of a healthy weight. Although this relative risk did not differ significantly by alcohol consumption, the absolute risk did.

The joint effects of BMI and alcohol consumption on liver disease in more than 9,000 men in Scotland were investigated in the second study, done at the Universities of Glasgow and Bristol investigated. Participants were tracked for an average of 29 years.

It was found that the combined effect of BMI and alcohol was much greater than the individual effects. (With Inputs from Agencies)