www.alkoholpolitik.ch

A new energy drink called „Four Loko“ has a 12-percent alcohol content and is loaded with caffeine and sugar, WABC-TV reported May 28. Twice the size of a regular can of soda, the 24-ounce energy drink sells for under $3 — cheaper than a beer — which officials in New York say makes it appealing to kids.
Four White Plains teenagers recently were hospitalized after drinking Four Loko, prompting warnings from White Plains Public Safety Commissioner David Chong. „The kids have a nickname for it, they’re basically calling it coke in a can,“ he said. (Source: Join Together, 6/1/10) See Video

A telephone survey of parental attitudes and behaviours regarding teenage drinking
Irish teenagers demonstrate high rates of drunkenness and there has been a progressive fall in age of first drinking in recent decades. International research indicates that parents exert substantial influence over their teenager’s drinking. We sought to determine the attitudes and behaviours of Irish parents towards drinking by their adolescent children. …
Conclusions: We found no evidence of widespread permissive attitudes and behaviours among Irish parents. Given that parental influences have been demonstrated to exert substantial impact on teenage drinking, it may be possible to harness the concerns of Irish parents more effectively to reverse the trends of escalating alcohol related harm in Ireland. (Source: BMC Public Health 2010, 10:297doi:10.1186/1471-2458-10-297, Published: 1 June 2010)

Fewer children are abusing booze but deaths are rising as north-south drinks divide opens in England.
Deaths from alcohol in England climbed to 6,769 in 2008, liver disease was the most common cause. Fatalities have risen by 24% since 2001. The figures, revealing a surge in prescriptions for medicines to treat alcoholism and a slight decrease in overall consumption, suggest that awareness of the health dangers and, possibly, the recession may be having some impact.
A cultural divide in drinking habits appears to be opening up between southern and northern England, with far less being drunk in London than elsewhere in the country. If overall consumption is falling, death rates – which chiefly reflect long term physical damage – will take some time to reflect any change. (Source: Harvard World Health News, 5/27/10) guardian.co.uk, 5/26/10

A premium vodka sold in a bottle shaped like a skull has been banned from sale in Ontario, Canada, where officials are concerned that the packaging could appeal to children, the Toronto Globe and Mail reported May 18.
Crystal Head Vodka, created by Canadian actor Dan Akyroyd, was rejected by the Liquor Control Board of Ontario — a semipublic entity with limited regulatory powers and a monopoly on retail liquor sales in Ontario. (Source: Join Together, 5/21/10)

Adolescents are being bombarded with alcohol marketing online as firms exploit new-media tools and lax regulation to put their brand images and information in front of young drinkers, according to a new report.
HealthDay News reported May 19 that American University professor Kathryn Montgomery — author of the report, Alcohol Marketing in the Digital Age (PDF) — said that alcohol is being sold through „a multiplicity of platforms throughout the day and night that includes online, offline, mobile, digital, music, video — a whole range of different ways that consumers interact with new digital marketing.“ (Source: Join Together, 5/21/10) our online-comment: Ridiculous is the fact that we allow an industry at all to advertise and promote their products which damage our health, reduce our quality of life and cost us billions each year in social costs. To say the state is making money from alcohol is ridiculous as well, when we compare the very small alcohol taxes with the enormous alcohol related social costs.
To speak with the children is a nice suggestion, often heard from the alcohol industry. A very small percentage of parents does it, the rest will use TV and the Web as babysitters as before.

The American Academy of Pediatricians (AAP) has recommended that doctors screen all of their young patients for alcohol use starting in middle school, the Wausau Daily Herald reported May 15.
The AAP Committee on Substance Abuse released a revised policy statement on youth alcohol use on May 1. „A remarkable amount of brain development is still occurring for young people through their 20s,“ said report lead author Patricia Kokotailo of the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health. „This policy statement provides better evidence about how alcohol affects the brains of young people and why it is important to screen children.“
Committee chair Janet Williams of the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio said that most doctors don’t routinely ask about youth alcohol use, and need to know how to provide prevention guidance and where to refer young drinkers to treatment. (Source: Join Together, 5/19/10)

Although acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is relatively rare in children, drinking alcohol during pregnancy could increase the risk, according to a recent paper published in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research.
Julie Ross, Ph.D., director of the division of pediatric epidemiology and clinical research at the University of Minnesota, said there are about 700 cases of AML in the United States in children each year. (Source: Medical News Today, 5/6/10)

Middle-school children whose parents restrict access to R-rated movies are substantially less likely to start drinking than their peers who are allowed to see such films, a new study suggests.
In a study of nearly 3,600 New England middle school students, researchers found that among kids who said their parents never allowed them to watch R movies, few took up drinking over the next couple years. (Source: Medical News Today, 4/27/10)

Parent complaints that two United Kingdom television ads featuring children discussing drinking’s negative effects would upset young viewers have failed to block the ads‘ airing, the Guardian reported April 21.
The Advertising Standards Authority has authorized continuation of the ad campaign from the Department for Children, Schools and Families, which is seeking to increase awareness of how alcohol use has a detrimental effect on other decisions made by young people. In the ads, children ages 8 and older talk about having been pressured to use drugs or have sex. (Source: Join Together, 4/26/10)

New presentation added, 4/8/10