- Britain's leading pressure group for safer drinking has
thrown its weight behind a campaign to place government health notices
on cans and bottles, warning that exceeding safe limits can seriously damage
health.
-
- In a move designed to heighten the debate about whether
tobacco-style warnings should be carried on bottles and cans, Alcohol Concern
last night added its voice to that of more than 1,100 UK doctors who are
increasingly concerned about the lack of easily understandable information
on alcoholic products.
-
- The campaigning group is also calling for a ban on the
alcohol industry targeting young audiences by sponsoring sports and television
programmes, such as Sex and the City, which is sponsored in Britain by
Baileys.
-
- The calls come after the largest survey of public awareness
of what constitutes excessive drinking revealed that Britons have no idea
how much they can safely drink.
-
- The Mori survey came on top of figures last week which
revealed that children aged just 11 are regularly consuming dangerously
large amounts of alcohol, at levels double that of 10 years ago.
-
- Around a quarter of 11-15 year olds in England admitted
to having drunk alcohol in the previous week, an average of 10.5 units
compared with 5.3 in 1990.
-
- 'We have found there is virtually no public awareness
of the potential dangers of alcohol, how much alcohol is contained in a
single unit or how much is too much,' said Lee Lixenburg of Alcohol Concern.
'Virtually no one we polled knew what the recommended number of units were.
These findings are very disturbing, he added.
-
- In recent years, Britain has developed one of the worst
binge-drinking problems in Europe with drinkers failing to grasp the dangers
in the same way as they have understood the messages concerning smoking
or drink-driving.
-
- The Mori poll will form the core of a offensive to be
launched next week by Alcohol Concern, designed to tackle the problem.
-
- Health experts - including Professor Roger Williams,
George Best's doctor - see the research as proof that the public needs
health warnings on bottles and cans of alcohol along the same lines as
those printed on cigarette packets.
-
- His calls are backed by Dr Christopher Record, a liver
specialist at the Royal Victoria Infirmary in Newcastle upon Tyne and one
of the campaign co-ordinators.
-
- 'Government campaigns have concentrated on the dangers
of drink-driving, drugs and smoking despite the fact that such products
kill far fewer people than excessive alcohol consumption,' said Record.
'Only with explicit labelling and stricter controls can we guarantee the
public has the information it needs to make decisions about how much they
want to drink.'
-
- On Friday, Record will present a petition on behalf of
the British Society of Gastroenterology and the British Association for
the Study of the Liver to three Newcastle MPs: Jim Cousins, Nick Brown
and Doug Henderson.
-
- The petition has been signed by 600 consultant physicians
in gastroenterology and hepatology in the UK, the experts at the front
line of the fight against alcohol-related liver disease in the NHS, and
500 other doctors.
-
- The number of young people dying from alcohol abuse has
tripled in 20 years, a figure that does not include deaths linked to alcohol-related
road accidents or heart disease.
-
- Worryingly, young British women now drink more than those
in any other European country, with many 18 to 24-year-old women consuming
the equivalent of more than five bottles of wine a week. 'The greatest
ignorance, however, will be among young men aged 16 to 24,' said Lixenburg.
'We already know these groups drink more heavily than any other social
pool.'
-
- Despite the growth of alcohol abuse, there has been no
concerted health campaign concerning alcohol since the DrinkWise advertisements
in the early 1990s. Instead, despite the fact alcohol kills twice as many
people as hard drugs including heroin, campaigns have concentrated on drugs
and smoking.
-
- 'There are several long-term physiological consequences
of binge drinking: high blood pressure, risk of liver cancer and cirrhosis,
reduced fertility, weight gain, blood-sugar problems, stomach inflammation
and bleeding, and increased risk of having a stroke,' said Record.
-
- The alcohol industry is resisting health warnings, claiming
drinkers will ignore the messages and that alcohol, unlike cigarettes,
is not unhealthy if taken sensibly.
-
- Record, however, points out that if just one per cent
of the 20 million people who exceed safe alcohol limits take notice of
the warnings each year, 200,000 people could be saved hospital visits -
at a cost of £1.4 billion to the NHS. Excessive drinking is a major
cause of antisocial behaviour and violence and alcohol is believed to cost
the NHS around £3 billion a year.
-
- Safe drinking
-
- Men are advised not to drink more than 3 to 4 units of
alcohol per day, and women no more than 2 to 3 units. * A pint of ordinary
strength lager - 2 units; a pint of strong lager - 3 units * A pint of
bitter - 2 units * A pint of ordinary strength cider - 2 units * A 175ml
glass of red or white wine - around 2 units * Pub spirit measure - 1 unit
* An alcopop - around 1.5 units
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- Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited
2003
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- http://www.guardian.co.uk/medicine/story/0,11381,1076041,00.html
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