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- Published on: 14 December 2017
- Published on: 14 December 2017Could alcohol control policies be a smokescreen?
Madureira-Lima and Galea developped an Alcohol Control Policy Index (ACPI) and claimed higher scores with their index were associated with lower consumption.(1) This deserved comment.
First, why looking for a complex and time consuming surrogate when the relevant endpoint, consumption, is so easy to assess? Moreover, if reliable data about consumption were not accessible, this would be the best indicator for lack of alcohol control policy.
Second, how France can rank in the top, 6th among 48 developed countries, for alcohol control? Indeed: a) France is among the barrels, the male population drank an average of 43g/day (female 13g) and, male regular drinkers drank 64g (women 45g).(2) b) serial laws in 2009 and 2016 were used to almost nullify the 1991 Évin law protecting people from alcohol advertising.(3,4) c) for the devastating flawed Responsibility Lansley only copied/pasted a 2006 decree (#159) issued by Bussereau, a French minister for agriculture;(5) d) France even lobbied against the Act about minimum alcohol pricing in Scotland, claiming it “would be disastrous on the balance of European trade”(6) e) the new president hired the CEO of the wine professional organization as his special advisor for agriculture (7) because alcohol is France's second biggest export sector after the aerospace industry.
Last, in my opinion no country has implemented alcohol control yet as alcohol control must be comprehensive with robust measures. Minimum alc...
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None declared.