www.alkoholpolitik.ch

Warning labels aimed at pregnant women will be added to all alcohol products in New Zealand and Australia.

The Australian and New Zealand Ministerial Council on Food Regulation agreed to introduce labelling telling of the risks of drinking alcohol during pregnancy at a Melbourne meeting last week in response to the recommendations of the independent Food Policy and Labelling Review.
The labelling will be regulated in two year’s time. …
(Source: Alcohol Reports, News, 12/20/11) nzherald.co.nz, 12/16/11

Research that claims lifting the price of alcohol will not curb binge drinking has been denounced by a leading alcohol health promotion group.

The research, from Australia’s Griffith University, found there was no significant change to the number of occasions people engaged in binge drinking when the price of liquor rose.

However, price rises did increase the number of days people went alcohol-free, while the the number of days people consumed between one and four drinks (non-binge drinking) also fell.

But Alcohol Healthwatch director Rebecca Williams said overall research had shown that price was one of the best tools available to reduce overall consumption and harm.

„Price is probably the sharpest tool in the shed as a mechanism for affecting harm. The overall research is very, very clear that it does target the things we need to target, which is the early drinking in young people, and the heavy drinking.“

The Law Commission recommendations on alcohol reform included a 50 per cent increase in excise tax, which would increase the price of alcohol by about 10 per cent on average.

The Griffith University research analysed household surveys of almost 80,000 people and asked them how their behaviour would change with a 1 per cent increase in the price of alcohol.

„There may be a need to broaden the net and better identify what policies can and cannot do and investigate alternatives to price increases,“ researcher Joshua Byrnes said.

Source: Alcohol Reports, 12/20/11) stuff.co.nz, 12/18/11

Comment: No wonder they didn’t find a significant change when asking about an increase of 1 per cent. Even a 10% increase could be too little.

Scientific Opinion of the Science Group of the European Alcohol and Health Forum

From the Foreword: The enormous burden of individual harm (often to those around the problem drinker as well as the drinker themselves) and aggregated lost productivity that are highlighted in the report should make it clear to all that inactivity is not an option and complacency will cost lives. We owe it to the populations we serve to use every opportunity that is founded in sound evidence to preserve and improve health and this report should lay the foundations of applying this to the workplace. But the workplace cannot be taken in isolation: just as work affects health and wellbeing beyond the workplace, so do many factors outside work, such as the price, availability and marketing of alcohol, or access to social programs and general healthcare reflect back on the health of the workforce. The Science Group believes that the European Commission across its various directorates has the potential to be a vital catalyst for good practice in this two-way process.
Professor Ian Gilmore
Chair, Science Group
From the Summary:
Impact of alcohol on the workplace and productivity
Globally, alcohol is the world’s number one risk factor for ill-health and premature death amongst the 25-59 year old age group, the core of the working age population. It is unsurprising, therefore that lost productivity costs feature as the dominant element in social costs studies arising from the harm done by alcohol (contributing to one half or more of the
total social costs). Becoming unemployed worsens alcohol-related harm, and heavy drinking, itself, leads to unemployment. Alcohol is a significant risk factor for absenteeism and presenteeism at work, largely in a dose response manner, with a relationship between societal and individual level of alcohol consumption and sickness absence. Although some studies have reported a positive impact of alcohol consumption on earnings, a proxy measure of productivity, a meta-analysis of relevant studies suggested that the relationship was an artefact. Often forgotten is the impact of drinkers on the productivity of people other than the drinker. An Australian study found this to be comparable in cost size as the lost
productivity costs of the drinkers themselves. The work place itself also impacts on alcoholrelated harm. Certain occupations (in particular bar staff and sea workers) are at particular risk, and, in general, stressful working environments increase the risk of alcohol-related harm.
(Source: Alcohol Reports, 12/18/11) ec.europa.eu, Sept. 2011
Comment: This report should be taken into account by all industrial leaders and governments. Especially interesting the part about the role of abstainers. It’s the same „artefact“ as we see in studies on alcohol and health.

The economics think-tank the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) have published a new report on Alcohol pricing and taxation policies. It echoes many of the findings from a report last year in which it suggested minimum pricing would transfer further profits to industry and retailers, therefore favouring increased taxation.

The new report however suggests the current alcohol taxation system is not optimal and a „sensible starting point would be to tax all alcohols at an equivalent rate per unit. Such a change would require policy action at the EU level which the Government should pursue.“ …

„…prefer higher and restructured alcohol taxes as an alternative to minimum pricing. At least with taxation the revenues flow to the Government rather than to the industry. Taxes that were more closely focused on the alcohol content of different products could also allow something closer to a minimum price to be introduced through the tax system, perhaps in tandem with a ban on below-tax sales.“

However Dr Petra Meier, who conducted the University of Sheffield modelling on pricing impacts has previously said both taxes and minimum pricing should be used to reduce alcohol-related harm as it should not be an ‚either or‘ argument. (Source: Alcohol Reports, 12/08/11) Alcohol Policy UK, 12/06/11

This supplement provides up-to-date estimates of the numbers (and percentages) of new cancer cases in the UK that are attributable to factors that have been established by international consensus as potentially avoidable causes of the disease. It therefore offers a useful guide to the relative importance of different preventive interventions.

Excluded from consideration are factors that, although known to be effective in reducing the risk of numerically important cancers, do not offer acceptable or practical preventive strategies at present. Early and multiple childbearing (to prevent breast cancer) and the widespread use of anti-androgen drugs (to prevent prostate cancer) come under this category. What remains is a limited number of important factors that can, at least to some extent, be affected by personal or political choices. The most important among these is continuation of the significant reduction in tobacco exposure. Next in importance are reductions in obesity and in heavy alcohol consumption, and certain other dietary changes. Each of these four main strategies for cancer control would also substantially reduce the burden of other non-communicable diseases, particularly cardiovascular, diabetic, renal and hepatic disease. … (Source: Alcohol Reports, 12/08/11) BJC British Journal of Cancer, 12/06/11
Comment: Today, a part of the Swiss parliament (chamber of the cantons) has refused to enter into discussion of a new law on prevention. Prevention should be private. The lobbyists have worked well. (Source: parlament.ch, 12/08/11)

81 per cent of African women report themselves to be non-drinkers, says data from the World Health Surveys. This is an important fact to take into account in planning of alcohol prevention strategies and policies.

In the latest round of the WHO World Health Surveys 40.739 women from 20 African countries were interviewed also about their alcohol drinking habits. Close to 34.000 reported lifetime abstinence from alcohol. This is 81 % of the respondents in the survey. The proportion of current alcohol drinkers ranged from 1% in Malawi to 20% in Burkina Faso.

Four researchers – Priscilla Martinez, Jo Røislien, Nirmala Naidoo and Thomas Clausen – have analyzed the data from the WHO survey and presented their results in an article published in BioMed Central. They point to the fact that “Alcohol use is an important factor in any woman’s health risk profile. Harmful patterns of alcohol consumption are strongly associated with increased morbidity and mortality”.

Read the full article here.

The conclusions of the article are: “A variety of drinking patterns are present among African women with lifetime abstention the most common. Countries with hazardous consumption patterns require serious attention to mitigate alcohol-related harm. Some similarities in factors related to alcohol use can be identified between different African countries, although these are limited and highlight the contextual diversity of female drinking in Africa”.

The researchers comment their findings by writing that the current situation with low prevalence of alcohol use among women represents an opportunity to establish and promote healthy drinking habits among the vast majority of African women. This would serve the public health of African countries far into the future.

At the same time the researchers sound a warning bell related to female drinking: “This effort would be particularly relevant and timely given the current expansion of the alcohol industry in Africa. Women are a large portion of the population available for recruitment into regular drinking and will also benefit from improved economic situations, creating a ‘perfect storm’ for an increase in alcohol use and related harm. Such circumstances and increases in hazardous drinking among women have already been observed in Brazil and India”.
(Source: Dag Endal on add-resources.org, 12/05/11)

High level meeting, Brussels, 17 November 2011. The 9th meeting of the Committee on National Alcohol Policy and Action
(CNAPA) took place on 17 November 2011. For the first time Member States were represented at senior level, in addition to regular CNAPA members. Attendance was very high. The meeting was chaired by Despina Spanou, Principal Advisor with DG Health and Consumers and Chair of the European Alcohol and Health Forum (EAHF). … (Source: EU-DG for Health and Consumers, 11/21/11)

Dear grown-ups, decision-makers in the European Parliament, in the national peoples’ representations, in the national governments and ministries, in the European Commission, We hope this letter finds you well.

We are not well. We are concerned because it looks like our future (is) broke.
In our organizations and for many of the young people and youth organizations we are cooperating with, the picture is clear: young Europeans are concerned, often even scared. We are extremely aware of the tremendous burden that is being put on each and every single young European, who will have to make huge efforts, work relentlessly to master the debt challenges collected and piled up by the grown-ups who have been making decisions in the past and do so today.
Millions of young Europeans – in youth organizations, schools, universities and the public places all over the continent – ask: how are we ever going to be able to pay back these paramount debts that exceed any form of imagination?

With this question came another realization: we, Europe’s youth, need the best possible conditions, tools and qualifications to be able to tackle the debt piled up by yesterday’s and today’s grown-ups. In that sense and in many other ways, it is wrong to cut and try and save money on education, youth facilities, culture. It is especially wrong when other measures go largely unnoticed. Therefore Active and (only) 30 of its members collected during 2 hours in Rome last weekend more than 130 postcards from people whom they met. 130 ideas what €125 Billion could be spent on – instead of paying for alcohol related harm every year. … (Source: Press Release activeeurope.org, 11/16/11)
Comment: This could be an essential part of the Occupy-movement.

A ban on the sale of alcohol below a minimum price will be introduced in England and Wales from 6 April 2012.

Shops and bars will not be able to sell drinks for less than the tax paid on them – a move the government says will cut crime.

It works out as 38p for a can of weak lager and £10.71 for a litre of vodka.

Health campaigners say the price „floor“ is too low to have any impact, but the drinks industry has described it as a „pragmatic solution“.

The move comes as the Scottish government presses ahead with plans to introduce a minimum price per unit of alcohol.

Its first attempt to do so, setting the price at 45p per unit, failed during the last Parliament, but MSPs have now reintroduced the bill and say the measure is needed as part of the „battle with alcohol misuse“. … (Source: bbc.co.uk, 11/08/11)

Prevention of Teen Substance Abuse Must Start with Tackling America’s Underage Drinking Epidemic. Let’s Make it Cool for Teens Not to Drink!

Joseph A. Califano, Jr.A recent survey of 7th through 11th graders in the Connecticut gold coast town of Westport, Connecticut, nails the importance of targeting alcohol use among teens for parents, teachers, pediatricians and public health professionals who seek to prevent teen substance abuse and addiction.

The survey by the Governor’s Prevention Initiative for Youth revealed that 25 percent of the town’s 9th graders, 37 percent of 10th graders, and 60 percent of 11th graders had been drinking alcohol in the previous 30 days. Translated from substance abuse statistical jargon to plain English, this means that these high school freshman, sophomores and juniors are current drinkers, likely drinking regularly. … (Source: CASA, Chairman’s Corner, 11/15/11)

our online-comment:
As long as politicians are not willing to reduce the harmful impact of the alcohol industry on society (TV-marketing is only one sector of many) in order to reduce alcohol consumption in general, youth will miss the good example and will hardly be convinced by educational prevention. Alcohol-lobbies are a sort of corruption. Not only in the Third World.