The incidence of melanoma is continuously rising over the last few decades, thus examining non-UV–related risk factors contributing to its continued rise is necessary.

Published data on obesity, smoking, and alcohol consumption trends were explored to understand human behaviors and their relationship to melanoma.

Pooled data were displayed using choropleth maps, each country’s data were plotted, and Spearman rank correlation coefficient (R) was calculated for melanoma incidence and mortality with each risk factor. 

The choropleth map of each risk factor displayed identical patterns to melanoma incidence and melanoma mortality. A positive correlation between melanoma incidence/mortality and all risk factors (obesity, smoking, and alcohol consumption) was found. Among all the factors, alcohol consumption had the strongest positive correlation with both melanoma incidence and mortality. Because the incidence of melanoma is higher in individuals with lighter skin color, this correlation data might indicate that alcohol consumption is high in countries with lighter skin color, like European ancestry. 

If the correlation between alcohol consumption and melanoma incidence is skin color dependent or independent, was reanalyzed and a positive correlation was found between alcohol consumption and melanoma incidence in Europe, Asia, and Africa. Especially, the strongest correlation was seen in European countries with exclusively lighter skin color, suggesting that the correlation between alcohol consumption and melanoma incidence is likely to be skin color independent. A positive correlation was also marked between alcohol consumption and melanoma mortality in all continents. 

To understand the role of genetic risk factors in the observed correlation between alcohol consumption and melanoma incidence/mortality, the correlation of aldehyde dehydrogenase 2 (ALDH2) rs671 polymorphism with both alcohol consumption and melanoma outcomes was investigated. The correlation analysis showed that the wild-type ALDH2 allele has strongly positively correlated with melanoma incidence and mortality, while the allelic variants have a modest to strong negative correlation with melanoma incidence and mortality. 

Thus an association between alcohol and melanoma outcomes globally has been described. The association exists both with melanoma incidence and its mortality. Also, the potential involvement of the alcohol-related gene ALDH2 was found. 

SOURCE- Batta N, Shangraw S, Nicklawsky A, Yamauchi T, Zhai Z, Ravindran Menon D, Gao D, Dellavalle RP, Fujita M. Global Melanoma Correlations With Obesity, Smoking, and Alcohol Consumption. JMIR Dermatol 2021;4(2):e31275. doi: 10.2196/31275