Is Alcohol too cheap?

No1Doyen


Joined: 04/07/2008
Posts: 16617

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 10:45

A health watchdog has added its voice to calls for a minimum price per unit of alcohol in England. The recommendation from the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) is in guidance on reducing the harm from excess drinking. NICE says about one in four adults is drinking too much and damaging, or at least risking, their health

No1Doyen


Joined: 04/07/2008
Posts: 16617

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 10:47

The coalition government agrees that alcohol misuse is a problem, but does not support a minimum price. NICE's guidance focuses on the damaging impact of excessive alcohol, and suggests ways for the government, the NHS and others to reduce the harm from misuse, based on the best available evidence. It says in 2005 alcohol consumption caused nearly 15,000 deaths. The watchdog puts the annual cost to the NHS at over £2bn, and it concludes that misuse may be linked to 1.2 million violent incidents a year.

No1Doyen


Joined: 04/07/2008
Posts: 16617

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 10:48

The guidance recommends a raft of measures, including banning advertising and making alcohol less easy to buy. This could include cutting how much holidaymakers are allowed to bring into the country from abroad, and reducing the number of shops selling alcohol, as well as the days and hours it can be bought.

Professor Mike Kelly, public health director at NICE, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that minimum pricing was the "most effective way of targeting problem drinkers". He added: "It wouldn't affect the 'on' trade by and large, because most pubs sell well above that price. It really is a measure designed to attack cheap alcohol in the 'off' trade." One of the leading authors, health economist Professor Anne Ludbrook, says this approach would target the heaviest drinkers.

No1Doyen


Joined: 04/07/2008
Posts: 16617

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 10:50

"Alcohol is much more affordable now than it ever has been - and the price people pay does not reflect the cost of the health and social harms that arise. "When it is sold at a very low price, people often buy and then consume more than they otherwise would have done." Professor Ludbrook says there would be a big impact on the price of heavily discounted alcohol in supermarkets. "At the example price of 50 pence, a bottle of vodka would be just over £13. Whereas in the supermarkets currently you could find vodka selling at below £8. Cheap white cider, for example, would go up to over £7 a bottle. It's currently selling at about £2."



 

Dusterbruce


Joined: 03/08/2007
Posts: 1125

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 11:06

Whatever the cost, those determined to binge drink will still abuse alcohol.



Binge drinking is nothing new, my peers and myself did it 40-odd years ago, and 25 years ago when I lived in a small city in the Midlands the city centre was like a war zone on Friday and Saturday nights.



Nothing will change it apart from education.

spider


Joined: 03/01/2009
Posts: 5527

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 11:15

Good post No1...and its not just the binge drinking thats the problem.People spend their days just topping up from day to day,Functional drunks that most of the time are not.!! I fell sorry for the families of these people watching a loved one become so dependent on the stuff.!



And we will always have the drunk drivers.!! I once counseled a young lad who had killed his best friend one New Years eve doing just that,This he has to remember each year!!



Spider,X

smoggyjim


Joined: 21/07/2007
Posts: 214

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 12:06

It is just another way to get your hard earned money out of your pockets what's next a extra tax on soft drinks because they cause obesity

stellasstar1



Joined: 02/07/2008
Posts: 1519

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 12:39

It is certainly far too cheap here.

ang1706


Joined: 28/01/2009
Posts: 570

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 12:59

I agree that Booze is still relativly cheap, I do not include the price in a pub but from an Off Sales and there are more and more gut wrenching copies of some spirits. I mean all those cheap SCotch Whiskys coming out with wonderful names that sound scots but are not, Vodkas too . The cheap french lagers at Tescos this is where the Government needs to look and check its pricing policy.

As rightly said above Alcoholic dependant people will ALWAYS drink it, same as smokers will always smoke!



I enjoy a drink and occassionally get bevied but its not regular and suffer haha, but there are people who drink to excess and always will do.

Chelpet


Joined: 10/03/2010
Posts: 253

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 14:36

Msg 5 can go back further than that in the 60s, when I was in forces stationed in Chatham a garrison town, the main idea was to walk the high street and have half a pint in every pub, there wasnt many that could do that, finally finishing off with a punch up with the matelots around the pie stall, before the MPs turned up, funny no mention of binge drinking then, all good fun on a Saturday night.

malsancak


Joined: 23/08/2009
Posts: 2874

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 15:24

minimum price/maximum supermarket profits

johnnybgoode


Joined: 08/12/2008
Posts: 252

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 15:37

let's not give the trnc government any idear's,

just cause it's cheap dosen't mean you have to buy it, ?????

No1Doyen


Joined: 04/07/2008
Posts: 16617

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 15:39

Chelpet. They were isolated incidences that you refer to. In 2010 this is going on in every town and city in the Uk.



If the Government are keen to stop this why not introduce a huge tax on alcohol?

malsancak


Joined: 23/08/2009
Posts: 2874

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 16:07

and a huge tax on junk food because of the damage it is doing to children's health and the resultant cost to the NHS. Perhaps alcohol should be a class B drug and treated in the same way cannabis is? Mind you there have been no cannabis related deaths so perhaps it should be class A. Tax fishing, the most dangerous sport...

TheStonedCrow


Joined: 27/06/2009
Posts: 96

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 21:14

No 1



I say bring down the price of alcholic drinks and ciggs



TSC

rowlo



Joined: 12/10/2008
Posts: 4796

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 21:24

mss15, and fuel lmao .

kenny



Joined: 26/05/2008
Posts: 405

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 21:26

I second that motion, stoned crow.

AlsancakJack



Joined: 14/08/2008
Posts: 5762

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 21:27

I think (hic) that incahol shud be four, sorry free. burp.

Back to the fridge. Call me when this serious situation is sorted.

TheStonedCrow


Joined: 27/06/2009
Posts: 96

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 21:29

Rowlo



I was going to say you can't drink or smoke fuel

but had second thoughts on that !!!!



TSC

Brinsley


Joined: 04/04/2009
Posts: 6858

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 21:36

The price of alcohol is not the problem, it's the small mouth some have, which means they can't get it down fast enough!



Richard

Scoty


Joined: 23/05/2010
Posts: 846

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 21:41

re msg 1 - glad it is only applying to England. At least the rest of the UK can drink cheap booze watching the world cup. With the crap the rest of the UK will have to listen to for 4 weeks - the cheaper the better

kenny



Joined: 26/05/2008
Posts: 405

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 21:50

scoty, at some point we will enjoy it !

newlad



Joined: 02/03/2008
Posts: 7819

Message Posted:
02/06/2010 21:51

Its my round i think,

Paul.