Conference told drinking needs to be 'denormalised'

A conference in Brisbane has been told that society needs to change the way it thinks about alcohol before there will be a reduction in binge drinking.

The Alcohol and Drug Foundation organised the conference to discuss ways to tackle the problem, with organisations and researchers from across the country attending the event.

Victoria's Professor Margaret Hamilton says drinking needs to be "denormalised".

"Its not really all that acceptable to have people who are out of control, vomiting, mess, aggressive, difficult to manage, making a hell of a mess," Ms Hamilton said.

"I think we've got to get that kind of thinking happening. That'll take a long time."

Related:

One in three pregnant women drink: study

More than one third of pregnant women drink despite most knowing the harmful effects alcohol can have on unborn children, a study has found. A paper, to be presented at the Royal Australasian College of Physicians annual congress in Adelaide on Tuesday, outlines the results of a telephone survey of 1,103 Australian women aged between 18 and 45.

Thirty-four per cent of the women surveyed consumed alcohol during their last pregnancy and 32 per cent said they would drink if planning, and during, a future pregnancy. Some 93 per cent of survey respondents knew alcohol could affect unborn children and 81 per cent agreed pregnant women should not drink alcohol.

Pediatrician Elizabeth Elliott says alcohol consumption early in pregnancy puts the unborn child at risk of birth defects, while consumption later can impact on the developing brain. "The message, really, for women should be that no safe level has been established, and that large amounts of alcohol frequently, and particularly early in the pregnancy, is likely to cause the worst outcomes," Professor Elizabeth Elliott said."Not drinking in pregnancy is the safest option and we particularly advise women not to become intoxicated."

The alcohol level in the mother's blood is the same as in her foetus. The risks of alcohol consumption during pregnancy are difficult to predict for each individual because factors such as a woman's weight, age and general health, come into play. About half of pregnancies are unplanned so inevitably many women have consumed alcohol before learning they are pregnant, Prof Elliott said. "What we do is reassure women that if they've drunk alcohol at low levels then it's likely that they've done no damage to their baby," she said.

Prof Elliott says Australian attitudes to alcohol are very tolerant. "So, in contrast to somewhere like the (United) States where if you're a pregnant woman in a pub drinking you might well have people coming up to you and telling you to stop drinking," she said. "That doesn't happen here as much."

There have been increasing levels of drinking by young women, she said. Prof Elliott says she hopes revised guidelines on safe drinking, to be issued by the National Health and Medical Research Council later this year, will include messages to women about the dangers of drinking during pregnancy. She said 95 per cent of women surveyed wanted doctors to ask them about alcohol consumption in pregnancy and to advise them of the potential harm to their foetus. "The community is ready for a tougher message on alcohol," she said. "We have got to not only give them (women) the knowledge but we have got to somehow change their attitudes."

Driver straps in beer, leaves kid loose

Police in Alice Springs say they were appalled to find a driver put a seatbelt around a carton of beer - but left a five-year-old child unrestrained.Officers stopped the unregistered sedan on the Ross Highway south of Alice Springs on the weekend. They found the child sitting in the back seat without a seatbelt, but the driver had put a belt around a slab of beer.

Alcohol boosts cancer risks: experts
A new study has found that drinking just two standard alcoholic drinks a day significantly increases the risks of developing breast, bowel, throat and mouth cancer.

Balmain hotels fill as young mourn pub mates
Many of those involved in the accident were from Balmain. Friends gathered, embraced and cried openly on Darling Street, and soon after were intoxicated with alcohol as well as grief. Balmain bar staff described the incident as a pub staff night gone wrong.

Calls for binge warnings on alcohol packaging
The Public Health Association (PHA) says warnings about the dangers of binge drinking should be pasted on all forms of packaged alcoholic drinks.

Support for booze public education
A SURVEY of 1000 Australians found more than three-quarters of those questioned about attitudes to drinking said there was not enough public education about the dangers of alcohol, despite the Rudd Government's promise of a multimillion-dollar binge-drinking strategy.

Calls for binge warnings on alcohol packaging

The Public Health Association (PHA) says warnings about the dangers of binge drinking should be pasted on all forms of packaged alcoholic drinks.

The Australia-New Zealand Food Regulation Ministerial Council has requested Food Standards Australia to consider putting warnings on all alcoholic drinks.

PHA chief executive Michael Moore says mandatory warnings are a must if Australia is to properly combat binge drinking.

"I think people should be warned about intoxication," he said.

"I think they should be reminded that drinking sensibly is one thing but drinking to get drunk is an inappropriate way to use alcohol and an unhealthy way to use alcohol."

Mr Moore says warnings must carry the basic message that getting drunk is unhealthy.

"I think that it is appropriate if we begin a labelling regime to apply to alcohol across the board," he said.

"I think it is appropriate to remind people that what we ought to be doing is drinking sensible and binge drinking or drinking regularly is really not good for your health."

Man stabbed in night of brawls

Three men have been arrested over a stabbing in Sydney's Darling Harbour, after police had to respond to three separate fights involving up to 30 people. A 24-year-old man was taken to Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Camperdown, after being stabbed in the back during one brawl, which occurred at a hotel on Wheat Road. Police say they were called to the hotel around 1.30am (AEST), with reports that three separate fights had broken out involving 30 people. Three men were later arrested over the incident. Two 18-year-olds and one 19-year-old have been taken to City Central police station, where the are currently being questioned, police said.

Meanwhile, two teenage boys have been charged after a separate altercation in Sydney's Hyde Park last night. Police say a group of 15 teenagers had gathered at the park, before a fight broke out among the youths at 1.30am (AEST). A 19-year-old Croydon Park man and 17-year-old from Burwood Heights were arrested by police patrolling the park.
Both have been charged with affray and will appear in court later this month. The 19-year old will appear at Downing Centre Local Court on May 23, while the teenager will face Bidura Children's Court the same day.

Related;

Balmain hotels fill as young mourn pub mates
Many of those involved in the accident were from Balmain. Friends gathered, embraced and cried openly on Darling Street, and soon after were intoxicated with alcohol as well as grief. Balmain bar staff described the incident as a pub staff night gone wrong. The Commercial Hotel on Darling Street had changed hands on Wednesday and it is understood that staff from hotels in the area had gathered to mark the occasion with a night of drinking and celebration.

Police name 6th harbour crash victim
Thirty-two-year-old Ashlei Ayres, a single mother of two, has now been named as one of the five people who died at the scene of the crash.

Support for booze public education
A SURVEY of 1000 Australians found more than three-quarters of those questioned about attitudes to drinking said there was not enough public education about the dangers of alcohol, despite the Rudd Government's promise of a multimillion-dollar binge-drinking strategy

Booze-fuelled violence doubles in decade

BOOZE-FUELLED assaults in NSW have doubled in number in less than 10 years, the state's auditor general has found.

A third of all the alcohol-related violent incidents also occurred at a licensed hotel or club, Auditor General Peter Achterstraat said today.

"A lot more needs to be done to enforce and promote the responsible service of alcohol," Mr Achterstraat said in releasing the report.

"We need to make sure that police are trained better, and the public is better educated and there is a consistency in the application of the laws across the state."

There were 10,305 alcohol-related assaults, or ARAs, statewide in the 1997-98 financial year.

The figure climbed steadily upwards during the early 2000s to stand at 20,475 ARAs in 2006-07.

"The increase in alcohol-related crime is disturbing," Mr Achterstraat said.

Part of the problem stemmed from the inconsistent application of laws surrounding the irresponsible service of alcohol, he said.

Mr Achterstraat said NSW police and the Office of Liquor, Gaming and Racing (OLGR) both had powers to lay charges but in some cases licensees would receive a verbal warning when, for a similar incident, another would be fined.

"Whenever you have two agencies involved in administering a program there is always the need to liaise closer, and invariably things can fall through the cracks," Mr Achterstraat said.

In terms of pub and club owners facing the courts, police referred 136 cases to prosecutors in 2007, well up on the 58 cases in 2006.

The OLGR referred just six cases in 2007, up from two in 2006.

The report, titled Working with Hotels and Clubs to Reduce Alcohol-related Crime, found NSW has a total 14,227 licensed premises.

Thirty per cent of ARAs occurred on licensed premises in 2006-07, another 35 per cent occurred outdoors, while 24 per cent were in residential homes.

Related:

Alliance tackles drunken violence
THE TOLL of alcohol-related violence has reached the point where one in five Australians now say they have been directly affected or know someone who has been affected by this type of violence, a new survey shows.

Support for booze public education
A SURVEY of 1000 Australians found more than three-quarters of those questioned about attitudes to drinking said there was not enough public education about the dangers of alcohol, despite the Rudd Government's promise of a multimillion-dollar binge-drinking strategy.

Alliance tackles drunken violence

THE TOLL of alcohol-related violence has reached the point where one in five Australians now say they have been directly affected or know someone who has been affected by this type of violence, a new survey shows.

The issue, which will be discussed at the 2020 Summit this week, has spurred a coalition of 30 organisations - including social welfare groups, research bodies and even a NSW local council - to form the National Alliance Against Alcohol Related Violence.

The alliance has released a Roy Morgan survey that suggests more than 84 per cent of Australians, or 14 million people, believe that binge drinking is increasing and there is a link between this and increased alcohol-related violence. The survey also shows that almost 60 per cent of Australians say they are concerned about alcohol-related violence when they go out at night and an equal number are more concerned about alcohol-related crime now, compared with three years ago. The research was based on a national telephone survey of 694 people.



[A survey of 1000 Australians found more than three-quarters of those questioned about attitudes to drinking said there was not enough public education about the dangers of alcohol, despite the Rudd Government's promise of a multimillion-dollar binge-drinking strategy.

Figures from Nielsen Media Research show that alcoholic beverage companies spent $122million on media advertising in the 12months to November 30, up 11.9percent on the year before.

The survey was undertaken by Galaxy Research for the April issue of the Federal Government-funded publication Of Substance.

Australian National Council on Drugs executive officer Gino Vumbaca said,"Government campaigns can be quite effective but the money always runs out, but the alcohol companies' ads continue,"

All alcohol in Australia is subject to GST and a mix of excise or customs duty or the Wine Equalisation Tax is charged on beer, spirits and wine.

Alcohol is second only to tobacco as a preventable cause of drug-related mortality and hospitalisation in Australia. In 1998-99, the annual cost of alcohol-related social problems was estimated to be $7.6billion.

Stephen Riden, spokesman for the Distilled Spirits Industry Council of Australia, said the cost is partly offset by Government revenue from taxes which it estimates to be $5.9billion this financial year.

This group is demanding the Federal Government make alcoholic beverage companies spend millions on media, advertising - Warning-Dangers-of-Alcohol.



Now the SMH has completely ignored the above survey and today came out with another one that has nothing to do with making alcoholic beverage companies spend millions on media, advertising - Warning-Dangers. And the general public wonder why?]

The group is demanding the Federal Government tax all alcoholic products by their volume of alcohol and that alcoholic drinks be exempted from competition policy and be regulated separately. The group also wants state and territory governments to reduce the number of and opening hours of outlets that sell alcohol.

The Federal Government did not respond to Herald questions. A spokeswoman for the NSW Premier, Morris Iemma, said the state government had appointed 30 police officers to new alcohol co-ordination teams and spent $2 million on the Alcohol Linking Program.

The formation of the alliance comes as the Herald continues a year-long freedom-of-information battle to obtain the names of the hotels in the police's linking data. It also comes after the Herald revealed that the mayor of Randwick Council, one of the alliance members, wants to force the Coogee Bay Hotel and the Beach Palace Hotel to close their doors early in an attempt to reduce alcohol-related crime.

Alliance organisations include the Alcohol Education Rehabilitation Foundation (AER), Australian National Council on Drugs, the Salvation Army, Randwick Council and the St Vincents Hospital Emergency Medicine Department (Melbourne).

The chief executive of AER, Daryl Smeaton, said the level of alcohol-related violence was now at crisis point.

The NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research found almost 45 per cent - 33,147 cases - of the 74,091 assaults in NSW in the year to September 2007 were alcohol-related.

A report for the Federal Government found the social cost of alcohol was about $15.3 billion in 2005.

The Reverend Tim Costello, who will chair the communities, families and social inclusion discussion area at the 2020 Summit, said he wanted to change national attitude to alcohol.

"I hope that by 2020 the idea of being intoxicated is as socially unacceptable as sexual harassment," Mr Costello said.

"How we get there is a mixture of an alcohol volumetric tax - taxing strong casks of wine more heavily that light beer, which worked in the Northern Territory - and looking at the opening hours of pubs and the concentration of outlets."

"I think it's now incomprehensible to young people that they can actually have fun without alcohol and without getting smashed," Mr Costello said.

REFORM AGENDA

* Tax alcohol by volume

* Remove industry from competition policy

* Reduce number of drinking outlets

* Reduce operating hours

So what happened to Message on a bottle for binge drinkers?

Quote: See the Herald seems to be playing a game it's called lets make sure alcohol is not labelled? For who may you ask? Corporations. Shame on the Sydney Morning Herald.

Related:

Labels, not taxes the solution to drunks: lobby group

Negligent parents face 3 years jail

Ban on late spirit sales

Govt unveils $53m to target binge drinking

Millions abused during boozy Christmas hols: study

Stress and debt make Sydney a violent city

Tobacco costs more than illicit drugs

THE social costs of tobacco, alcohol and illicit drugs have been rising faster than inflation and, at more than $56 billion a year, outstrip the Federal Government's health budget.

Even though smoking rates are falling, the toll from tobacco accounts for more than half of all drug costs to the community, according to a report the Health Minister, Nicola Roxon, is releasing today.

The three drug groups cause ill-health, accidents, premature death, crime and lost productivity with their cost easily exceeding the $45 billion the Federal Government spends on health.

Ms Roxon is expected to cite the huge costs identified in the government-commissioned report to promote the need for "cultural change" to counter unhealthy habits which trigger chronic disease.

Prepared by the Sydney academics Professors David Collins and Helen Lapsley, the report is the most comprehensive study on the social costs of tobacco, alcohol and illicit drugs in nearly a decade.

Based on the latest available data, covering 2004-05 it shows the real costs of tobacco are estimated to have jumped by 23.5 per cent to $31.5 billion in the six years to 2005.

The rise in the real costs of illicit drug use was less than half, at 11.3 per cent to $8.2 billion in the same period. Alcohol was estimated to generate $15.3 billion in social costs in 2005, but the growth in costs was not available because of statistical changes.

Although the number of smokers is falling, the delayed effects of past smoking means that costs have continued to rise.

At an Australian Institute of Health Policy Studies conference today Ms Roxon is expected to warn of the difficulties in bringing cultural change to habits like smoking and heavy drinking and to reorient health policy to focus more on prevention.

"This won't be simple, and it won't be quick. Cultural shifts are complex and difficult to achieve," she says.

The Government will soon announce a national preventive health taskforce whose priority targets will be obesity, tobacco and heavy drinking. The Government has already announced $50 million for three combat plans targeted at binge drinking.

What set the Rudd Government apart from its predecessors, she said, was the recognition that the rise of preventable chronic disease "also poses a front-line economic challenge".

The impact of poor health on workforce participation and productivity was something Australia could not afford at a time of skills shortages. Greater focus on prevention, not just in the health system but more broadly, would yield economic and other benefits.

The Government had commissioned Treasury to produce a report into the economic benefits of increased focus on illness prevention.

Future intergenerational reports would include an assessment of the impact of preventable chronic diseases and policies to combat them.

Yesterday Ms Roxon urged the pharmaceutical industry to engage "more fully" in the Government's health reform agenda.

She told a Medicines Australia meeting that both the recently appointed National Health and Hospitals Reform Commission and the proposed Preventive Health Taskforce would widely consult health and community groups. "I would encourage you to take full advantage of this consultation."

Related:

Parents of drunk children face fines
Nearly 1,700 children were treated in hospital for alcohol in the past year - some as young as 10.

Support for booze public education
A SURVEY of 1000 Australians found more than three-quarters of those questioned about attitudes to drinking said there was not enough public education about the dangers of alcohol, despite the Rudd Government's promise of a multimillion-dollar binge-drinking strategy.

Message on a bottle for binge drinkers
BOTTLES of alcoholic drinks could soon carry graphic pictures warning of the dangers of excessive alcohol consumption as part of the Federal Government's latest series of measures to cut down on under-age and binge drinking.

Support for booze public education

A SURVEY of 1000 Australians found more than three-quarters of those questioned about attitudes to drinking said there was not enough public education about the dangers of alcohol, despite the Rudd Government's promise of a multimillion-dollar binge-drinking strategy.

Figures from Nielsen Media Research show that alcoholic beverage companies spent $122million on media advertising in the 12months to November 30, up 11.9percent on the year before.

The survey was undertaken by Galaxy Research for the April issue of the Federal Government-funded publication Of Substance.

Australian National Council on Drugs executive officer Gino Vumbaca said,"Government campaigns can be quite effective but the money always runs out, but the alcohol companies' ads continue,"

All alcohol in Australia is subject to GST and a mix of excise or customs duty or the Wine Equalisation Tax is charged on beer, spirits and wine.

Alcohol is second only to tobacco as a preventable cause of drug-related mortality and hospitalisation in Australia. In 1998-99, the annual cost of alcohol-related social problems was estimated to be $7.6billion.

Stephen Riden, spokesman for the Distilled Spirits Industry Council of Australia, said the cost is partly offset by Government revenue from taxes which it estimates to be $5.9billion this financial year.

Solution: Make alcoholic beverage companies spend millions on media, advertising - Warning-Dangers-of-Alcohol!!!

Related:

Labels, not taxes the solution to drunks: lobby group

Message on a bottle for binge drinkers