Alison O’Connor: Call me old fashioned, but I prefer advice from health professionals to that from a group sponsored by the booze industry
It's a serious case of only in Ireland -- a group funded by our drinks industry objects to a Department of Health report on how to get people to drink less alcohol, and they get a higher billing in the subsequent headlines.
The booze industry must be thrilled with the money they are pouring into their initiative, MEAS -- the Mature Enjoyment of Alcohol in Society -- which has the aim of getting Irish people to "respect" alcohol more.
MEAS has reason to crack open some bubbly in celebration after the masterstroke of successfully hogging the limelight surrounding the launch of the National Substance Misuse Strategy Steering Group report. They got as much, if not more, exposure than the people who we, as the taxpayer, fund to actually look after our health.
We don't know how much the industry contributes to fund MEAS, but it really is money well spent, especially when you hear the group's objections running second on the RTE headlines, ahead of the recommendations. For all the chicanery of the cigarette industry they never managed to get even remotely close to such establishment respectability.
MEAS was not initially invited to join the group but muscled their way in. They then proceeded to beat a very loud drum on the day the report was published in an obvious attempt to drown out some of the excellent initiatives it suggested.
They also wrote to all government ministers claiming they were marginalised and misrepresented on the group, and submitted their own separate minority reports, as did the Alcohol Beverage Federation of Ireland.
I have to say a drinks-industry-funded crowd getting marginalised on a Department of Health group set up to try and get people to drink less, sounds like another positive step to me.
As the report itself states, in somewhat of an understatement, the majority of the steering group was concerned about the role of MEAS in promoting responsible drinking, since MEAS is funded by the alcohol industry.
MEAS, in case you missed it, was not happy. No siree. They yelped their unhappiness. How come we tolerate this carry on, and not a group called, say, the Mature Enjoyment of Nicotine. or indeed Marijuana? It's simply another indicator of how committed we are to our drinking, and how alcohol consumption, to excess, forms such a part of our national psyche.
Their dissatisfaction, which equates directly to dissatisfaction on the part of the drinks industry, means the other 30 or so members of the group should take a deep bow and congratulate themselves. They have clearly come up with a set of recommendations that the industry find threatening, and, if implemented, will hopefully result in us drinking less.
Some of the most controversial proposals made in the report recommend a ban on all alcohol sponsorship of sporting and large outdoor events; a ban on outdoor advertising of alcohol; higher excise duties on some alcohol products, and the introduction of minimum pricing.
There is also the introduction of a "social responsibility levy" on the drinks industry which could be used to help fund communications on the dangers of alcohol.
MEAS don't like this social responsibility levy calling it "yet another tax on the Irish consumer". This is because "in the real world", as their spokeswoman acknowledged, it will be passed on to the hard-pressed Irish drinker. The notion of banning alcohol industry sponsorship by 2016 is "misguided", they say. Actually the research has shown it is not only well guided, but it works.
When drinks companies sponsor sport it increases the amount of alcohol that people consume. It also reduces the age they start to drink alcohol. Why else would the industry be getting increasingly involved in this type of sponsorship? It's hardly for the love of the game.
Yes it is true, as they point out, that such a ban would cause huge hardship for sporting organisations who rely on this sponsorship. But the flip side of this from the perspective of the State is that the drinking habits of its citizens result in an extraordinarily expensive health bill every year.
Just for starters -- alcohol is associated with 2,000 beds being occupied every night in Irish acute hospitals, one-quarter of injuries presenting to emergency departments and over half of attendances to specialised addiction treatment centres. The average Irish adult drank 11.9 litres of pure alcohol in 2010, corresponding to 482 pints of lager, 125 bottles of wine or 45 bottles of vodka.
Given that 19pc of the adult population are abstainers, the actual amount of alcohol consumed per drinker is considerably more. So I imagine there would be a lot more money to go around to sporting bodies if these health bills could be reduced.
MEAS also objected to the recommendation to put more resources into the HSE website "drugs.ie", instead of building on the successful drinkaware.ie website, which is their own creature.
Is it only a bad-minded person who would imagine that this drink-industry-funded group does not wish to have its website's supremacy overtaken -- by a state-funded one -- for fear of ceding control?
It really is hard to keep a straight face when witnessing their umbrage. Health, they say, is everyone's business and it is not the exclusive preserve of public health authorities.
Cheers to all of that, but I'm afraid I'm old fashioned in preferring the advice and recommendations of the country's top health professionals. They have produced a report that is strong on evidence and comprehensive in its analysis rather than the offerings of an industry that has a vested interest in keeping us all drinking our heads off.
- Alison O’Connor
Irish Independent
