Education not effective in limiting alcohol abuse

Education in schools is one of the least effective ways of limiting alcohol abuse while the most effective were taxation, limiting availability, and regulation of advertising, according to Alcohol Action Ireland executive director Marion Rackard. This was proven by national and international research, she said.

Ms Rackard was responding to findings from a Behaviour & Attitudes survey conducted last April on behalf of Drinks Industry Group of Ireland (DIGI), but published only yesterday.

It found that the measure to limit alcohol abuse most favoured by those surveyed was education in schools (26 per cent), followed by better/stricter law enforcement (21 per cent), and tighter laws on underage drinking (19 per cent).

Ms Rackard pointed to the recent Health Research Board (HRB) report which showed that pure alcohol consumption in the State dropped to current levels in 2003 following an increase in excise duty on spirits and cider in the December 2002 budget.

Currently, 13.35 litres of pure alcohol are consumed in the Republic for every person over 15 - the fourth-highest level in the EU.

Ms Rackard, whose group lobbies against alcohol abuse, called on the Government to set up a national organisation to combat alcohol-related harm.

She said "alcohol abuse is at the top of nobody's agenda when it comes to health promotion".

As well as being a drug, alcohol was toxic and its abuse was related to 60 diseases, she said. "It is a key health determinant," she added.

The survey found that just 3 per cent of respondents suggested raising taxes on alcohol as a method of combating abuse,with 9 per cent favouring the banning of all alcohol sponsorship and only 12 per cent in favour of banning all alcohol advertising.

It also found that 40 per cent of respondents said drinkers themselves had key responsibility for the abuse problem, while 23 per cent blamed parents, with 19 per cent blaming publicans/the licensed trade and 22 per cent blaming young people.

While 74 per cent of adults felt the problem of alcohol abuse was "serious", the number who described it as worse than five years ago had declined to 58 per cent, from 70 per cent in surveys conducted in both 2006 and 2005.

Numbers of respondents who spontaneously blamed drinkers had risen from 31 per cent in 2006 and 28 per cent in 2005. The number blaming parents was comparable, to 26 per cent in 2006 and 23 per cent in 2005.

But the 19 per cent spontaneously blaming publicans/ licensed trade was a drop of 4 per cent on last year's findings and a drop of 10 per cent since 2005.

Graham Wilkinson, founding director of Behaviour & Attitudes, said the research was designed to measure broad attitudes to alcohol abuse among the public, based on the following questions: how serious is the problem; how does this compare versus five years ago; who is to blame for the problem; and how should this be addressed?

It also asked people what they believed should be done to deal with alcohol abuse.

Michael Patten, chairman of DIGI said: "This research clearly demonstrates that the public want the better enforcement of existing regulations rather than the imposition of new measures such as higher taxes or the banning of alcohol advertising or sponsorship."