Do you recall the times when you visited entertainment venues with friends, often feeling out of place for not consuming alcohol?
Your friends would enthusiastically describe the sensations of a drink, commonly referred to as ‘kamnyweso’, urging you to take a sip. Before long, you might find yourself graduating from a single bottle to two, and the cycle continues until you realize you can’t imagine a night out without it.
The fleeting happiness that alcohol provides might entice you, yet experts caution that over time, vital organs, particularly the liver, bear the consequences.
Peter Kariuki, 30, recounts the fear he experienced upon learning that excessive alcohol consumption had damaged his liver. He began drinking in 2005 during high school, succumbing to peer pressure. “I started with beer and then switched to chang’aa,” he shares.
By 2024, after nine years of drinking, Peter noticed alarming symptoms, such as unexplained body itchiness. A doctor’s report diagnosed him with fatty liver disease, a condition characterized by fat accumulation in the liver, and advised him to cease alcohol consumption.
However, Peter found this challenging; after a few weeks of trying to quit, he returned to his old habits. “I went to rehab, but eventually, I relapsed,” he admits.
The accessibility and affordability of chang’aa made it all too easy for him to fall back into his previous routine.
In 2025, his health deteriorated further—his stomach swelled, his skin and eyes turned yellow, and he began vomiting blood. “I thought I was going to die because they told me my liver had failed,” he recalls. “I was genuinely worried.”
Now a civil servant, Kariuki has committed to abstaining from alcohol. He often reflects on the potential consequences for his young family, which strengthens his resolve to never drink again. “I only visit the club to buy alcohol for my friends,” he jokes.
An impending disaster
Dr. Maureen Kaunda, a liver specialist from the Ministry of Health’s Noncommunicable Diseases division, explains that consistent excessive alcohol intake over a decade leads to alcoholic liver cirrhosis, a permanent scarring of the liver.
The liver serves as the primary organ for alcohol metabolism, she clarifies. In the early stages, heavy drinking leads to fatty liver disease, which can progress to alcoholic hepatitis—an inflammation of the liver—after three to five years of heavy consumption. Eventually, it can culminate in alcoholic liver cirrhosis.
Dr. Kaunda emphasizes the importance of early intervention, stating, “If someone stops drinking at the fatty liver disease stage, the condition is reversible, as the liver has a remarkable ability to heal itself over time.”
She warns that as alcohol consumption continues, the liver becomes overburdened with its detoxification responsibilities, neglecting other essential functions. If the condition advances to alcoholic liver cirrhosis, treatment options become limited to managing symptoms such as jaundice, abdominal pain, and in severe cases, confusion.
Once liver damage occurs due to cirrhosis, no medication can restore it. However, if the individual abstains from alcohol, further damage can be halted. “Some may think that a single bottle a day won’t harm them,” Kaunda cautions.
