Heavy Drinking Linked to Deadlier Brain Haemorrhages

It’s long been known that heavy drinking raises blood pressure and damages the liver. But a new study suggests it may also deal a devastating blow to the brain – causing life-threatening haemorrhagic strokes.

The study, published November 5 in Neurology, found that people who consumed 3 or more alcoholic drinks a day experienced bleeding strokes inside the brain an average of 11 years earlier than light or non-drinkers – and faced worse outcomes such as larger bleeds, greater brain damage, and higher death risk.

Haemorrhagic strokes occur when a weakened blood vessel ruptures and bleeds into surrounding brain tissue. They are far deadlier and more damaging than the more common ischemic type.

Alcohol makes the brain shrink slightly while the skull remains the same size, stretching delicate veins and making them more likely to rupture, even with minor trauma. Alcohol also destabilises blood pressure, impairs platelet function (the blood cells that help form clots), and damages the liver, which disrupts normal clotting.

Over time, it can also directly injure small cerebral vessels – leading to microscopic leaks or “microbleeds” that weaken vessel walls. The net effect is a greater tendency to bleed – and to bleed more severely once a haemorrhage begins.

Beyond brain bleeds, “heavy drinking harms almost every organ in the body, raising the risk of accidents, high blood pressure, atrial fibrillation, liver disease, heart disease, several cancers, and cognitive decline,” says Edip Gurol, lead author of the study and director of the Hemorrhage Risk Stroke Prevention Clinic at Massachusetts General Hospital.

Conversely, cutting back on alcohol brings benefits such as lowering blood pressure (often within weeks), improving liver and heart health, and reducing the risk of stroke and microvascular brain damage over time.

Source: National Geographic (14 November 2025)