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The new EUCAM Newsletter with Fact Sheets on sport sponsoring by alcohol producers in Europe, kids being overexposed to irresponsible alcohol marketing and more…
Newsletter

The European Alcohol Policy Alliance has launched a new website to flag up the risks associated with alcohol consumption and cancer.

Alcohol is a carcinogenic (cancer causing) substance, yet only 1 in 5 people are aware of the risks that alcohol can bring. 10% of the total cancers in males and 3% of the total cancers in females are thought to be associated with alcohol consumption. A range of cancers are linked to alcohol, including liver cancer and prostate cancer. Any alcohol can increase the risk, so there isn’t a „safer“ alcoholic drink to gravitate to. …
(Source: Eurocare, 07/02/12)

State Control of Alcohol: Protecting the Public’s Health

Pennsylvania Republican House Majority Leader Michael Turzai recently gave up the fight to privatize liquor sales in the state, at least for the moment. The battle to privatize Pennsylvania’s 620 state-owned liquor and wine stores, and to allow the sale of alcohol by non-state retailers, has been raging in Pennsylvania for several years. In 2010, then-gubernatorial candidate (now governor) Tom Corbett made alcohol privatization a key part of his election campaign. Since then, advocates for state control and new research findings regarding its effectiveness have helped fight off the ill-fated plan.

When the 21st Amendment repealed national prohibition in 1933, states became responsible for
regulating alcoholic beverages. While many states decided to license private businesses to sell alcohol,
18 states chose to control alcohol sales themselves. The goal was to provide a legal way for people
to obtain alcohol, but also encourage moderate consumption by reducing economic incentives for
maximum sales.

States that currently have monopolies over control either beer, wine, or spirits (or some combination)
are: Alabama, Idaho, Iowa, Maine, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, New Hampshire, North Carolina,
Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, and Wyoming. In
addition, Montgomery County, Maryland controls spirits, beer, and wine (the only jurisdiction that
controls all three). …
(Source: Alcohol Justice, 06/27/12)

In Focus
Launch of Eurocare recommendations for a future EU alcohol strategy
Estonia is developing an alcohol policy green paper

News from Eurocare
Actis (Norway): The Government says no to curbing serving hours
Alcohol and Society (Denmark) challenges Carlsberg over the promotion of alcohol in Denmark
Alcohol Focus Scotland: Scottish policy developments
SLAN (Sweden): Summer updates

News from the European Union Institutions
Presentations from the 10th meeting of the Committee on National Alcohol Policy and Action
EU Health Programme – Annual report 2010
Health-EU Portal survey ….

News from across Europe

New research and reports

Upcoming events
(Source: Eurocare, 06/19/12)

ICan_postern Lancashire, Community Alcohol Networks (CANs) have been developed by the Trading Standards Alcohol and Tobacco team, in conjunction with Lancashire Constabulary, to adopt a partnership approach to reduce alcohol-related crime and problems amongst young people.

Lancashire have released a CAN Practitioner Toolkit and a CAN Problem Oriented Partnership report.

The project was established with the aims of reducing young people’s access to alcohol in order to reduce risky drinking and alcohol fuelled anti social behaviour. It also aimed to reduce problems by tackling proxy purchasing through enhanced enforcement activity in identified hotspots. In addition it aimed to raise awareness of alcohol related health and social issues amongst young people, parents and the wider community.

Over 12 weeks the Community Alcohol Networks were claimed to have achieved :

51 per cent reduction in alcohol fuelled anti social behaviour
violent crime has reduced by 22 per cent
criminal damage has seen an 11 per cent reduction ….
(Source: Alcohol Policy UK, 06/18/12)

Sport is not an arena for alcohol promotion

This weekend, UEFA Euro 2012 kicks off in Warsaw. During the next weeks 1.4 million fans are expected at the stadiums, and millions of people will follow the championship from more than 200 territories around the world. This is a brilliant opportunity to promote sport, physical activity and a healthy lifestyle. However, looking at the sponsors to UEFA Euro 2012, healthy lifestyle is not the message put forward when exposing the audience with sponsors such as Coca Cola, McDonalds and Carlsberg. Carlsberg is one of the leading breweries in the world, and is one of the official sponsors to the UEFA Euro 2012.

In 2009, global sponsorship spending was estimated for 44.8 billion USD; compared to 5.6 billion in 1987. It must be working and paying off. ‘It is extremely disappointing that with such an unique platform UEFA with silent blessing of political leaders is choosing to promote alcohol over health. To associate and brand football together with alcohol is more than problematic. It is simply lack of any long term consideration of the impact bad health will have on the population.’ says Mariann Skar- Secretary General of European Alcohol Policy Alliance. …
(Source: Eurocare, 06/7/12)

A new Keystone Research Center report has found that states with more control of the sale and distribution of alcohol have fewer alcohol-related traffic fatalities than states with no such controls. The new analysis showed that with all else equal, a state with control characteristics like Pennsylvania has 58 fewer adult deaths per year from alcohol-related traffic accidents than it would if the state had no control over the distribution of alcohol. The findings reinforce the recent Community Preventive Services Task Force recommendations against the privatization of alcohol sales, and are particularly relevant in Pennsylvania given recent moves to privatize there. Check out Alcohol Justice fact sheets for more info on: – Effectiveness of State Control
– Dangers of Alcohol Sales Privatization
(Source: Alcohol Justice, 6/6/12)

The latest annual statistics on alcohol for England 2012 have been released by the ONS, confirming a continuing rise in alcohol-related and primary alcohol attributable hospital conditions. Alcohol-related admissions rose 11% on the previous year with primary diagnosis conditions up 2.1%. Ns_logo

This comes despite falls since 2004 in the proportion of adults reporting drinking alcohol. Continuing admissions – many being long term conditions – are thought to be linked to decades of rising consumption prior to 2004. Additionally indications that amongst some groups, those who are drinking are drinking more.

Some key facts from the report include:

A 2.1% increase in primary diagnosis alcohol conditions (198,900 for 2010/11) since the previous year and a 40% increase since 2003 (142,000).
A 11% increase on alcohol-related admissions (based on attributable fractions) totalling 1,168,300 for 2010/11.This is more than twice as many as in 2002/03 (510,700). …
(Source: Alcohol Policy UK, 06/5/12)

In 2011 we organized the First European Conference on Alcohol Law Enforcement in Rotterdam. The conference was a successful start of a network on alcohol law enforcement in Europe. This year we are continuing the network initiative with a conference in Stockholm at 15 and 16 November 2012. Theme of the second conference is Reducing public drunkenness and over-serving related violence. Every European city is facing this problem and every law enforcer that is active at night-time will recognize this issue. There are some very interesting best practices on reducing alcohol related violence in Europe and there is a lot of research on evidence based interventions. In November we will present those best practices and bring the specialists on this topic in Europe together with the members of the European Network for Alcohol Law Enforcement.

Signing in for the conference is possible by this link: http://www.fhi.se/conf20121115
(Source: European Network for Alcohol Law Enforcement, 05/31/12)

Young people in Switzerland are consuming twice as much alcohol as was previously believed, with many young adults drinking large amounts at the weekend.
These were the results of a research project supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) and presented on Wednesday. Psychologist Emmanuel Kuntsche and his team from the addiction centre Sucht Schweiz in Lausanne conducted a mobile phone survey of 183 western Swiss (86 men and 97 women) aged between 19 and 26. For five weeks the participants had to give hourly updates from Thursday to Saturday on their consumption of alcohol, from early evening to midnight as well as the following morning. At the beginning of the survey they were also questioned on their consumption during the previous 30 days. …
(Source: Google Alcohol News, 05/28/12) bazonline.ch, 05/23/12