TY - JOUR
T1 - Do alcohol control policies have the predicted effects on consumption?
T2 - An analysis of the Baltic countries and Poland 2000-2020
AU - Rehm, Jürgen
AU - Tran, Alexander
AU - Gobiņa, Inese
AU - Janik-Koncewicz, Kinga
AU - Jiang, Huan
AU - Kim, Kawon Victoria
AU - Liutkutė-Gumarov, Vaida
AU - Miščikienė, Laura
AU - Reile, Rainer
AU - Room, Robin
AU - Štelemėkas, Mindaugas
AU - Stoppel, Relika
AU - Zatoński, Witold A
AU - Lange, Shannon
N1 - Funding Information:
Research reported in this publication was supported by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism of the National Institutes of Health (NIAAA) [Award Number 1R01AA028224]. JR acknowl-edges funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Institute of Neurosciences, and Mental Health and Addiction (CRISM Ontario Node grant no. SMN-13950). The authors would like to thank Astrid Otto for English copy-editing and referencing the manuscript.
Funding Information:
Research reported in this publication was supported by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism of the National Institutes of Health (NIAAA) [Award Number 1R01AA028224 ]. JR acknowl-edges funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Institute of Neurosciences, and Mental Health and Addiction (CRISM Ontario Node grant no. SMN-13950 ). The funders had no influence on the design, analyses or reporting of the study.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 Elsevier B.V.
PY - 2022
Y1 - 2022
N2 - BACKGROUND: Many population-based alcohol control policies are postulated to work via changes in adult alcohol per capita consumption (APC). However, since APC is usually assessed on a yearly basis, often there are not enough data to conduct interrupted time-series or other controlled analyses. The current dataset, with 21 years of observation from four countries (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland), had sufficient power to test for average effects and potential interactions of the World Health Organization's (WHO) three "best buys" for alcohol control: taxation increases leading to a decrease in affordability; reduced availability (via a decrease in opening hours of at least 20 %); and advertising and marketing restrictions. We postulated that the former two would have immediate effects, while the latter would have mid- to long-term effects.METHODS: Linear regression analysis.RESULTS: Taxation increases and availability reductions in all countries were associated with an average reduction in APC of 0.83 litres (ℓ) of pure alcohol per year (95 % confidence interval: -1.21 ℓ, -0.41 ℓ) in the same year, with no significant differences between countries. Restrictions on advertising and/or marketing had no significant immediate associations with APC (average effect 0.04 ℓ per year; 95 % confidence interval: -0.65 ℓ, 0.73 ℓ). Several sensitivity analyses corroborated these main results.CONCLUSIONS: The WHO "best buy" alcohol control policies of taxation increases and availability restrictions worked as postulated in these four northeastern European Union countries.
AB - BACKGROUND: Many population-based alcohol control policies are postulated to work via changes in adult alcohol per capita consumption (APC). However, since APC is usually assessed on a yearly basis, often there are not enough data to conduct interrupted time-series or other controlled analyses. The current dataset, with 21 years of observation from four countries (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland), had sufficient power to test for average effects and potential interactions of the World Health Organization's (WHO) three "best buys" for alcohol control: taxation increases leading to a decrease in affordability; reduced availability (via a decrease in opening hours of at least 20 %); and advertising and marketing restrictions. We postulated that the former two would have immediate effects, while the latter would have mid- to long-term effects.METHODS: Linear regression analysis.RESULTS: Taxation increases and availability reductions in all countries were associated with an average reduction in APC of 0.83 litres (ℓ) of pure alcohol per year (95 % confidence interval: -1.21 ℓ, -0.41 ℓ) in the same year, with no significant differences between countries. Restrictions on advertising and/or marketing had no significant immediate associations with APC (average effect 0.04 ℓ per year; 95 % confidence interval: -0.65 ℓ, 0.73 ℓ). Several sensitivity analyses corroborated these main results.CONCLUSIONS: The WHO "best buy" alcohol control policies of taxation increases and availability restrictions worked as postulated in these four northeastern European Union countries.
KW - Alcohol control policy
KW - Best buys
KW - Taxation
KW - Affordability
KW - Availability
KW - Marketing ban
KW - Alcohol per capita consumption
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85141982398&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - https://www.mendeley.com/catalogue/a512a488-51b7-3959-baa2-bd989a8b7665/
U2 - 10.1016/j.drugalcdep.2022.109682
DO - 10.1016/j.drugalcdep.2022.109682
M3 - Article
C2 - 36402051
SN - 0376-8716
VL - 241
JO - Drug and Alcohol Dependence
JF - Drug and Alcohol Dependence
M1 - 109682
ER -