www.alkoholpolitik.ch

PRESS RELEASE

Brussels, Belgium, 21^st September 2018

We are still number one but hopefully not for long – Europe’s alcohol consumption
WHO Global Status Report on Alcohol and Health 2018

More than 3 million people died as a result of harmful use of alcohol in 2016, according to a report released by the World Health Organization (WHO) today. This represents 1 in 20 deaths. More than three quarters of these deaths were among men. Overall, the harmful use of alcohol causes more than 5% of the global disease burden.

Europe continues to have the highest per capita consumption in the world. The good news is that per capita consumption has decreased by more than 10% since 2010. However, Europe has the highest rates of current drinking among 15–19-year-olds, followed by the Americas (38%) and the Western Pacific (38%). School surveys indicate that, in many countries, alcohol use starts before the age of 15 with very small differences between boys and girls.

European Alcohol Policy Alliance (Eurocare) wants to remind the European Institutions of the Council Conclusions on Cross-border aspects in alcohol policy – tackling harmful use of alcohol during the Estonian Presidency in December 2017.

Mariann Skar, Secretary General of Eurocare said:
“Juncker’s Commission has neglected and ignored alcohol policy. We are still waiting for decision on such, one might imagine, simple issue as whether consumers should have calories on the labels. Not to mention the missed opportunity of Audiovisual Media Services Directive to reduce exposure to alcohol advertising. Last but not least, we still have minimum excise duties from 1992. The progress we are seeing in Europe is because of courageous actions at a Member States level, countries such as Estonia, Lithuania, Poland, Scotland, Finland have implemented progressive alcohol policy solutions’‘.

Member States have clearly shown that there is a will to do more to tackle alcohol related harm. Juncker’s Commission has to quickly increase its efforts to find a way to actualise these Council Conclusions.
Conclusions highlighted several areas of action and call on the European Commission to:

• Produce and adopt a new EU Alcohol Strategy
• Monitor and evaluate the adequacy of the current measures in the online advertising of alcoholic beverages
• Support Member States in the framework of a new Joint Action – RARHA
• Support research and studies in areas such as for instance cross-border purchases
• Propose better provisions for alcohol labelling by the end of 2019

WHO’s Global status report on alcohol and health 2018 presents a comprehensive picture of alcohol consumption and the disease burden attributable to alcohol worldwide. It also describes what countries are doing to reduce this burden.

Source: Eurocare, 18/09/21

69th IOGT World Congress urges governments to make alcohol policy the priority it should be and calls for Framework Convention on Alcohol Control.

42 countries, 77 delegates and 320 participants all together took part in the 69th session of the IOGT International World Congress. Together they issued the following declaration:

Make Alcohol Policy Solutions The Priority They Should Be

We, the delegates of the 69thIOGT International World Congress “Future Made Here”, gathered to galvanize fresh momentum in our efforts to tackle alcohol as major obstacle to sustainable development.

We note with alarm the lack of progress in preventing and reducing alcohol harm in countries around the world.

13 of 17 Sustainable Development Goals are adversely affected by alcohol. Every ten seconds a human being dies due to an alcohol-related cause. Globally, alcohol is the leading risk factor for premature death and disability among people between the ages of 15 to 49. Alcohol harm is decimating our families, hurting our communities, undermining our economic productivity, and impeding progress for all. All this is manufactured and fueled by the alcohol industry, their harmful products and unethical business practices, which include tax avoidance, pervasive marketing and industry self-regulation.

Not only is Big Alcohol ruthlessly pursuing profits with no regard for Human Rights, human dignity, and human well-being. The alcohol industry is also engaging in aggressive political activities to undermine, derail and obstruct evidence-based and cost-effective alcohol policy measures that would benefit people and societies.

We are deeply concerned about the fact that our governments are dangerously off track in fulfilling their commitments to promoting a better life for all through tackling alcohol harm.

Independent science shows that the alcohol policy best buys hold considerable and largely untapped potential to promote health,  foster development and to protect especially vulnerable groups like children and youth, women and people in deprived and marginalized communities. For example, a $1 investment in the alcohol policy best buy measures generates a return of $9 dollars. These alcohol policy best buys are important tools to help achieve the SDGs.

The lack of progress in policy implementation and enforcement since the adoption of the WHO Global Alcohol Strategy in 2010 make the need for a binding international agreement abundantly clear.

Therefore, we call for the adoption of a Framework Convention on Alcohol Control. In the era of the Agenda 2030, sustainable development will not be possible without renewed and high-level political commitment and persistent, evidence-based action to prevent and reduce alcohol harm.

It is high-time that governments make alcohol policy solutions the priority they should be in order to achieve development for all.

Source: IOGT International

Original Contribution
Alcohol Consumption at Midlife and Risk of Stroke During 43 Years of Follow-Up
Cohort and Twin Analyses
Pavla Kadlecová, MSc,
Ross Andel, PhD,
Robert Mikulík, PhD,
Elizabeth P. Handing, BA and
Nancy L. Pedersen, PhD
STROKE AHA.114.006724 Published online before print January 29, 2015, doi: 10.1161/STROKEAHA.114.006724

From the International Clinical Research Center, Neurology Department, St. Anne’s Hospital, Brno, Czech Republic (P.K., R.A., R.M.); School of Aging Studies, University of South Florida, Tampa (R.A., E.P.H.); Department of Neurology, St. Anne’s University Hospital and Medical Faculty of Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic (R.M.); Department of Medical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden (N.L.P.); and Department of Psychology, University of Southern California, Los Angeles (N.L.P.).
Correspondence to Pavla Kadlecová, MSc, Pekařská 53, 656 91 Brno, Czech Republic. E-mail kadlecovap{at}fnusa.cz

Abstract

Background and Purpose—Although alcohol–stroke association is well known, the age-varying effect of alcohol drinking at midlife on subsequent stroke risk across older adulthood has not been examined. The effect of genetic/early-life factors is also unknown. We used cohort and twin analyses of data with 43 years of follow-up for stroke incidence to help address these gaps.

Methods—All 11 644 members of the population-based Swedish Twin Registry born 1886 to 1925 with alcohol data aged ≤60 years were included. The interaction of midlife alcohol consumption by age at stroke was evaluated in Cox-regression and analyses of monozygotic twins were used. Covariates were baseline age, sex, cardiovascular diseases, diabetes mellitus, stress reactivity, depression, body mass index, smoking, and exercise.

Results—Altogether 29% participants developed stroke. Compared with very-light drinkers (<0.5 drink/d), heavy drinkers (>2 drinks/d) had greater risk of stroke (hazard ratio, 1.34; P=0.02) and the effect for nondrinkers approached significance (hazard ratio, 1.11; P=0.08). Age increased stroke risk for nondrinkers (P=0.012) and decreased it for heavy drinkers (P=0.040). Midlife heavy drinkers were at high risk from baseline until the age of 75 years when hypertension and diabetes mellitus grew to being the more relevant risk factors. In analyses of monozygotic twin-pairs, heavy drinking shortened time to stroke by 5 years (P=0.04).

Conclusions—Stroke-risk associated with heavy drinking (>2 drinks/d) in midlife seems to predominate over well-known risk factors, hypertension and diabetes, until the age of ≈75 years and may shorten time to stroke by 5 years above and beyond covariates and genetic/early-life factors. Alcohol consumption should be considered an age-varying risk factor for stroke.

Eurocare_Press_Release_Alcohol_can_cause_cancer

_limit_your_intake_4th_Feb_2015

Content:
65th World Health Assembly – Non-communicable Diseases – Alcohol Target Missing
Also in this issue:

– NCDA Global Platform faces opposition from COI coalition
– One in eight deaths in Europe between the ages of 15 and 64 “is caused by alcohol”
– German medical students not taught about alcohol problems
– Leading alcohol beverage producers agree to extend common marketing standards and reinforce selfregulation across the EU
– Study on the affordability of alcoholic beverages in the EU
– Irish Republic and Northern Ireland come together to hold first All-Island conference on alcohol
– French Breathalyser Law
etc.
THE GLOBE, Issue 3 2012

OAK CREEK, Wis. —Wade Michael Page, the gunman in Sunday’s Sikh temple shooting, had a history of problems with alcohol, which led to him losing his military career and, more recently, a job as a trucker.

Page, 40, was shot to death by a Wisconsin police officer after he killed six Sikh worshipers at a temple here and shot another officer. He was discharged from the Army in 1998 because he had been found drunk during military exercises, according to law enforcement authorities. He was convicted of driving under the influence a year later in Colorado. And a trucking company confirmed Tuesday morning that it fired Page two years ago after he was pulled over in North Carolina for driving while impaired. ….
(Source: Join Together, 08/08/12) washingtonpost.com, 08/07/12


Comment: This to remember for all those who believe that their drinking is only their own business,their private affair.

Considerations under European Law and the implications for European public health
Scotland has amongst the highest rates of alcohol-related harms in Western Europe and over the last three decades has observed an approximate 3-fold increase in alcohol-related mortality.1 The Scottish Government has identified the affordability of alcohol as a key component for an effective strategy in addressing these harms. While increases in alcohol duty can be used to reduce affordability, responsibility for determining alcohol duty lies with the UK rather than Scottish Parliament so the introduction of a minimum unit price (MUP) is being considered as a more targeted alternative. Its potential introduction raises a number of important legal considerations that bear relevance to future public health legislative measures across the European Union. In this article, we outline some of the main considerations as illustrated by the case study of MUP in Scotland and discuss the implications for countries across Europe and other areas of public health policy. …
(Source: Alcohol Reports, 07/27/12) eurpub.oxfordjournals.org, August 2012 (payable) Eur J Public Health (2012) 22 (4): 457-458. doi: 10.1093/eurpub/cks091

Preliminary results show alcohol-related traffic fatalities dropped in the year since the state began requiring an ignition interlock for those convicted of drunken driving.

The Kansas Department of Transportation reported Friday that the state recorded 59 alcohol-related traffic fatalities between July 1, 2011 — when the law took effect — and June 30 of this year. That compares with 125 and 137, respectively, for the previous two years. …
(Source: Alcohol Reports, 07/25/12) sfgate.com, 07/20/12

A report exploring the potential role of promoting lower strength drinks to address alcohol harms has been produced by the Liverpool John Moores University (JMU) Centre for Public Health.

The rapid literature review identified both opportunities and threats to improved health through the increased availability of lower strength alcohol. The report suggests that if lower strength drinks result in ’substitution‘ for higher strength drinks there can be potential public health benefits. However it also identifies ‚addition‘ as a likely affect, whereby lower strength drinks result in an increased number of situations where alcohol is consumed. The report concludes that encouraging production and consumption of lower alcohol products in a single product category is unlikely to maximise effects on population level harms. …
(Source: Alcohol Policy UK, 07/3/12)