News
- Challenge and Change: Rod Anderson
- Parliament must come together to renew and reinvigorate MUP
- A responsible drinking campaign that features cocktail recipes
- Unacceptable rise in alcohol-specific deaths
- Health experts share concerns about complaint made on MUP evaluation
- Decline in alcohol treatment in Scotland
- Challenge and Change: Lived Experience Voices on Alcohol Marketing
- Blog post for Alcohol Awareness Week 2023
- Final verdict on MUP
- Alcohol and diabetes
- Doctors say lack of response on alcohol deaths could spell disaster for Scotland
- MUP reduces deaths and hospital admissions
- Alcohol hospital admissions continue to be too high
- Lessons learned from countries with marketing restrictions
- What is the effect of alcohol marketing on people with or at risk of an alcohol problem?
- ONS figures show highest alcohol deaths on record
- MUP and alcohol sales
- Scottish Government launches alcohol marketing consultation
- MUP and alcohol products and prices
- Scottish Health Survey 2021
- New licensing policy review guide
- Slight increase in alcohol-specific deaths
- Health campaigners call on Scottish Government to regulate alcohol packaging
- Scottish charity calls for ban on all alcohol promotion
- New NCD Prevention Report - Mapping Future Harm
- Online Alcohol Sales & Deliveries: A survey of young people in Scotland
- Four years of MUP
- Prominent health warnings make drinking “unappealing”
- Insights from People in Recovery
- Meet our Engagement Team Marc
- Meet our Engagement Team Megan
- Report on alcohol sales and harm in Scotland during the COVID-19 pandemic
- Sugar content in wine revealed
- Alcohol hospital admissions lower during pandemic
- Study reveals those already at risk from heavy drinking bought more alcohol during lockdowns
- Alcohol policy measures could reduce ambulance callouts
- 18.6% increase in deaths from alcohol in 2020
- Widespread support for calls to increase minimum unit price for alcohol to 65p
- Students as Change Agents
- Health charities call for action to save lives from Scotlands biggest killers
- Three quarters of Scots back new controls to help protect children from alcohol advertising
- Alcohol-specific deaths in Scotland increase
- More accurate estimates for the burden of Alcohol on the Ambulance Service: around 1 in 6 callouts in Scotland are alcohol related
- How can alcohol labels be improved to help people make informed consumption choices
- Health experts call for better alcohol labelling
- Young people and their views on alcohol marketing
- Lowest alcohol sales in Scotland for 26 years
- Minimum unit pricing has lasting impact study shows
- Euros renews call for action to protect children from alcohol sports sponsorship
- Current alcohol labelling of little relevance to young adult drinkers
- Governments should step up efforts to tackle harmful alcohol consumption
- Scottish public and leading health experts back changes to alcohol labelling
- AFS calls for 65p minimum unit price for alcohol
- How will the main parties prevent harm from alcohol?
- Alcohol labelling reform is way past its sell by date
- Alcohol policy priorities for the next parliament
- Young drinkers believe prominent health warnings on alcohol could boost risk awareness
- Alcohol and the Workplace Effective Interventions
- Alcohol sales and consumption in Scotland during the pandemic
- How can we prevent alcohol deaths?
- Alcohol Deaths and Minimum Unit Pricing
- YoungScot Health Panel report on alcohol marketing and harm
- Young Scots show support for restrictions on alcohol marketing
- New release of alcohol related hospital admissions
- Better alcohol labelling – A way to boost awareness of the risk between alcohol and cancer?
- NICE Guidelines on FASD Surveillance or Support?
- Alcohol Deaths Prevention Support
- Almost half of Scots in favour of minimum unit pricing
- Leading health charities call for action in Scotland
- Health experts campaign for better understanding of Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder
- Health experts call for alcohol labelling overhaul
- Australian ministers agree to visible pregnancy warning
- Alcohol Focus Scotland welcomes new WHO report on alcohol pricing
- Survey shows Scots lockdown drinking rise caused by stress
- Statistical analysis of off-trade alcohol sales in the year following MUP
- Alcohol Focus Scotland Review of statements of licensing policy 2018 to 2023
- We need to continue long-term focus on alcohol
- Scots report changing drinking patterns during coronavirus lockdown
- Time to Blow the Whistle on Alcohol Sport Sponsorship
- New evidence demonstrates that alcohol ads lead to youth drinking
- Alcohol sales fall in first year of MUP
- First study published into under 18 drinkers post MUP
- Commission on Alcohol Harm calls for evidence
- Two years on Are annual functions reports reaching their potential?
- We need to do more to protect our children and young people
- New Alcohol Deaths Prevention Support Now Available from AFS
- Scottish primary children call for action on alcohol
- Its time to tell us whats in our drinks
- A home for Rory
- Making a bad impression - blog post
- Alcohol marketing and children debate in the Scottish Parliament
- Alcohol sales and MUP
- Lowest alcohol sales in 25 years
- Research into fall in violence
- The Children's Parliament investigates an alcohol-free childhood
- Minimum unit pricing one year on
- More about sales data
- A family of resources it is all about prevention, education and resilience
- AFS publish Review of Licensing Board Annual Functions Reports 2017-2018
- Marketing unmasked dispelling the myths and taking a stand
- No place for alcohol marketing in sport
- Scotland publishes first UK guidelines for diagnosing fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD)
- The Alcohol Framework 2018 Preventing Harm
- Scotlands new drug and alcohol strategy launched
- AFS welcome new alcohol strategy
- Recent reporting on alcohol sales data
- Diageo is failing to provide latest guidelines on their products
- Drinks companies keeping consumers in dark about risky drinking
- Reducing alcohol consumption can address health inequalities
- Global first alcohol policy set to save hundreds of Scots' lives
- AFS welcomes minimum unit pricing for alcohol
- Truer picture of alcohol harm revealed
- Alcohol causes 3,700 deaths in Scotland every year
- Scotland's licensing system needs clearer direction
- Minimum pricing blog
- Minimum pricing gets green light
- Alcohol brands and young people
- Time for honest conversations about alcohol
- Q&A on alcohol marketing
- UK children anxious about parents' drinking
- Alcohol producers failing to inform public
- Concern over alcohol-related deaths
- We need to make it easier for people to drink less
- Worrying rise in alcohol-related deaths
- Minimum pricing will save lives
- Pocket money prices for alcohol continue
- Scotland's alcohol problem laid bare
- Cheap alcohol is costing Scotland dear
- One drink a day can increase breast cancer risk
- Poverty linked to increased harm from alcohol
- What next for reducing alcohol harm in Scotland?
- Scotland must do more to turn tide of alcohol harm
- Concern as funding for alcohol services cut
- Scottish Government urged to curb alcohol marketing
- Consumers have the right to know health risks
- Alcohol-free childhood is healthiest option
- SWA granted leave to appeal minimum pricing
- Scottish Greens call for action on alcohol marketing
- SWA will appeal to UK Supreme Court
- SWA urged to respect minimum pricing decision
- Minimum pricing can be implemented in Scotland
- AFS welcomes revised alcohol consumption guidelines
- Emergency services face shocking levels of alcohol abuse
- Every child has the right to grow up safe from alcohol harm
- New toolkit to help children affected by family alcohol problems
- Alcohol campaigners unite to call for stronger protection from alcohol advertising to children
- No completely 'safe' level of drinking
- New alcohol guidelines published
- Minimum pricing - European court ruling
- Alcohol: a global concern
The Alcohol Framework 2018 Preventing Harm
The Scottish Government published their new Alcohol Framework 2018: - Preventing Harm next steps on changing our relationship with alcohol, on the 20 November 2018. Joe Fitzpatrick, Minister for Public Health, Sport and Wellbeing unveiled the new framework at the 8th European Alcohol Policy Conference in Edinburgh.
We were pleased to see commitments on marketing and labelling as well as the pledge to review the current minimum unit price of 50 pence.
In 2017, Alcohol Focus Scotland, along with our partners SHAAP, SFAD and BMA Scotland, made recommendations to the Scottish Government encouraging action to reduce the exposure of children to alcohol advertising and sponsorship. There is strong support from the Scottish public to limit marketing of alcohol products and the evidence is clear that exposure to marketing has links with increased consumption among our children and young people.
It is encouraging that the Minister has spoken of the ‘compelling evidence’ of the need to protect children from alcohol marketing and the Framework includes a commitment to consult on alcohol marketing. Mention is made of marketing in public spaces, sport sponsorship and online and digital channels. The Scottish Government have also pledged to press the UK Government to protect children and young people by restricting alcohol marketing on television to after the 9pm watershed, and in cinemas. We believe these are positive steps towards protecting the vulnerable and challenging alcohol’s prominent role in our society.
The Framework includes a welcome commitment to improving alcohol labelling. It is completely unacceptable that more information is required on a pint of milk than a bottle of wine. The Scottish Government have said that they will be prepared to consider pursuing a mandatory approach in Scotland if industry fails to include CMO guidelines, and other health information, on products by the UK deadline of September 2019. A review of alcohol labels undertaken in August this year showed less than 10% of labels contained the CMO guidelines which came into force in January 2016.
AFS is also pleased to see a commitment to review the 50 pence minimum unit price after we raised the point in our consultation submission in January this year. We highlighted that although the benefits will still be significant, the probable effectiveness of a 50p minimum unit price will have declined over the five years or so since the policy became legislation, and we sought a commitment of a review to ensure that the benefits of this life-saving policy are fully optimised.
In Scotland we have seen up close the alcohol industry’s determination to derail and delay the implementation of life-saving minimum unit pricing legislation. We believe that organisations who put their profits over people’s health should have no part in shaping alcohol policy or in providing health advice. We are encouraged to see that the Scottish Government have included within the framework the commitment that they will not work with industry on “health policy development, on health messaging campaigns or on provision of education in schools and beyond the school setting.” This is a clear and principled stance which we hope others will follow.
One area of the Framework where we’d like to see stronger action is in addressing how widely available alcohol is. Alcohol death rates and hospitalisations are twice as high in areas with the highest availability. There is real potential for our licensing system do more to protect our most vulnerable communities who are suffering the greatest harm by controlling where and when alcohol is sold. The Framework includes a commitment to keep the system under review which is very welcome, and we will continue to monitor progress.
Read our response to the Alcohol Framework 2018 from Alison Douglas, chief executive at Alcohol Focus Scotland.