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Article by Thomas F Babor, a. Department of Community Medicine, University of Connecticut School of Medicine, Farmington, CT, 06030, United States of America.
Science plays an increasingly important role in the development of international health policy and this has certainly been true in the case of a global response to alcohol-related problems. In May 2010, the World Health Assembly adopted resolution EB126.R11, Global strategy to reduce the harmful use of alcohol,1 based in part on an impressive amount of evidence on both alcohol’s contribution to the global burden of disease and the policies capable of ameliorating the harm it causes.2 Now that the strategy has been adopted, it is time for public health science to take on two new challenges. The first is to expand the evidence base so that it applies not just to the developed countries where most of the world’s alcohol consumption is concentrated, but also to the low- and middle-income countries where alcohol consumption is increasing and where the policy response is still weak. The second challenge is to use scientific research to guide the adoption of effective alcohol policies at the national and international levels. …. (Source: Bulletin of the World Health Organization 2010;88:643-643. doi: 10.2471/BLT.10.081729