Alcohol - Health Committee Contents


Memorandum by the Drinkaware Trust (AL 56)

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

    — The scale of alcohol misuse in the UK is extensive and varied, placing a disproportionate burden upon the NHS.

    — The Drinkaware Trust believes that one essential approach must be to provide independent and clear information to consumers in a neutral space so that they can make informed decisions about their alcohol consumption.

    — Behavioural change is a process which cannot happen quickly. The UK drinking culture can be changed if educational initiatives receive sufficient investment over a long enough period.

INTRODUCTION

  1.  The Drinkaware Trust (Drinkaware) is an independent charity established in January 2007 as a UK wide, public-facing body with the objective of positively changing public behaviour and the national drinking culture to help reduce alcohol misuse and minimise alcohol-related harm, funded by voluntary donations from across the alcohol industry.

  2.  Established initially for a three year period (2007-09) following government proposals for a producer fund, Drinkaware is uniquely placed as a trusted independent source of information for consumers. This will enable them to make informed decisions about their own alcohol consumption and health.

SCALE OF ALCOHOL MISUSE IN THE UK

  3.  Recent results from the General Household Survey showed that over a third (37%) of adults had exceeded the Government's recommended guidelines of 2-3 units for women and 3-4 units for men on at least one day in the past week. 20 per cent of adults consumed more than double the benchmark on their heaviest drinking day of the week. This represents a slight increase from 2006.[49]

  4.  There are different causes for concerns across age groups. Those in the 16-24 age bracket were more likely (at 28%) to have drunk more than double the guidelines than any other age group on their heaviest drinking day.[50] This is an alcohol consumption pattern associated with anti-social disorder and accidents. However, adults aged over 45 were more likely (at 21%) to drink five days a week or more, a pattern of increasing concern amongst liver specialists.[51], [52]

  5.  Latest figures showed that the number of 11-15 year olds who have never tried alcohol has risen to 46% in 2007. This is an encouraging improvement from 39% in 2003. However, there is still a worrying increase in levels of alcohol consumption amongst those drinking; from an average of 9.5 units in 2003 to 12.7 in 2007.[53]

  6.  This level of alcohol misuse represents a heavy burden on the NHS. Alcohol misuse is calculated to cost the health service £2.7 billion per annum.[54] In 2006-07, there were over 800,000 alcohol-related hospital admissions, an increase of around 9% on 2005-06.[55]

ROLE OF THE DRINKAWARE TRUST

  7.  The Department of Health white paper Choosing Health: Making healthy choices easier placed a strong emphasis upon the importance of individuals taking responsibility for their own health.[56] However, individuals cannot do this without clear information. They are also highly sensitive to perceived excessive "nannying" from the state. The government's own FRANK initiative has established a successful model for communications lacking any state associations. Drinkaware seeks therefore to provide clarity on alcohol in a similar neutral space, by providing a one-stop shop of information through its flagship website www.drinkaware.co.uk, and other vehicles. The site receives over 100,000 unique visitors a month, and is currently helping over 2,600 people monitor their personal alcohol consumption using our online unit calculator and drinks diary feature.

  8.  Across the UK there is a diversity of people working to tackle this problem and Drinkaware works in full partnership with voluntary and community organisations, through our alcohol awareness grants programme and supports a wide range of practitioners including PCT, youth group workers and teachers with our educational materials—over 85,000 are distributed a month.

  9.  The Trust is funded by voluntary donation by the alcohol industry. We invite donations from producers, on-trade retailers and off-trade retailers. The target level of funding for 2008 was £4 million. The actual funding we received in 2008 was £2.6 million, of which £2.2 million was donated by the Portman Group. The targeted funding for 2009 was £5 million. Changing attitudes and behaviour on a national level will require long term and more substantial financial—something that is already happening in other public health areas. We have seen this most notably in the government-industry partnership Change4Life, which is benefitting from a £75 million commitment from government and £200 million media spend commitment from the Advertising Association's 33 member companies.

SOLUTIONS

  10.  There is continued debate about the most effective methods of reducing excessive alcohol consumption. Legislation, regulation, self-regulation and enforcement all have an important part to play. However, education should always have a central role. At the root of the alcohol misuse problem in the UK is behaviour ingrained in our culture for thousands of years. The public cannot be expected to accept attempts to change these deep-rooted social habits without clear information about the extent of the problem, and how it applies to them.

  11.  We have seen however that the problem of alcohol misuse varies across different population groups. If the behaviour is different so should the initiative designed to change this behaviour. Drinkaware therefore favours the social marketing approach of targeting initiatives across appropriate lifestyles and life stages.

  12.  Our 2008 campaign "Alcohol: How much is too much?" took such a targeted approach in communicating with 'hazardous' drinkers who due to consuming the majority of their alcohol at home did not necessarily know they might be consuming too much. One of the key tasks for alcohol public education campaigns is enabling people to identify that the message is targeted at them. We were therefore incredibly pleased that in an evaluation of the campaign 71% of hazardous drinkers were able to identify that the ad was aimed at them and that 75% of hazardous drinkers also agreed that the ads made them think about their alcohol consumption.



  13.  Engaging with the alcohol misuse issue is only the first step in what can only be a long process of behavioural change. Drinkaware sees its task as one that will not be achieved over night. Our approach is to ensure that people are equipped with the latest expert information about alcohol from which they can make informed decisions about their own alcohol consumption, by reaching out to consumers in strategically targeted ways. In this way we believe can contribute in a significant way to reducing the burden upon the NHS, narrowing the scale of alcohol misuse spread across the population and producing a future healthier UK.

  14.  A key task for 2009 is to secure agreement on the funding and development of Drinkaware after the expiry of the current agreement at the end of 2009. The continuing and full support of the industry and government will be necessary if this is to happen.

April 2009









http://www.nwph.net/alcohol/lape/NWPHO_La_LapeIndicators200902.xls



49   Office of National Statistics, Smoking and drinking amongst adults 2007, ONS (2009). Back

50   ibid. Back

51   ibid. Back

52   Hatton J, Burton A, Nash H, Munn E, Burgoyne L, Sheron N. "Drinking patterns, dependency and life-time drinking history in alcohol-related liver disease". Addiction 2009; 104: 587-592. Back

53   Drug use, smoking and drinking amongst young people in 2007, The Information Centre (2008). Back

54   The cost of alcohol harm to the NHS in England: An update to the Cabinet Office (2003) study Department of Health (2008) Back

55   NI39 updated figures, North West Public Health Observatory, 2008 at Back

56   Choosing Health: Making healthy choices easier, Department of Health (2004). Back


 
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