It’s Alcohol Awareness Week!

posted by Andy - 13:33 19/10/10

Alcohol Awareness Week (AAW) 2010 runs from Monday 18 October to Sunday 24 October in England and Wales, and is organised by Alcohol Concern.

We spoke to Phil Ramsell, Alcohol Health Promotion Specialist at NHS Bolton about why AAW was set up and how the expected spending cuts will affect alcohol treatment services.

Phil has been working with d2 on various projects over a number of years, including most recently the delivery of web based interventions / brief advice and the ‘Alcohol the Flipside’ campaign that has been launched in support of this years AAW in Bolton.

What is the purpose of alcohol awareness week?

It’s a real chance for those involved in health, social care and community safety to work together.  Public health, treatment service providers, local authorities, the medical and social care professions and the general public all participate in AAW and use it as an opportunity to highlight societal harm caused by alcohol misuse.

Alcohol Awareness Week is held once a year and gives organisations the chance to combine resources and make the most of the cumulative effect of a concentrated weeks worth of publicity and PR. The theory is that the impact of a combined effort is worth more than the sum of each part.

Which audience is the campaign trying to reach?

The national theme for the week is 'alcohol and childhood' which encompasses both the impact of alcohol use by young people, and the impact on children of parental drinking and other external factors.

 However local areas also use the week to promote messages that fit with their own needs.

The challenges we have in the North West are significantly worse than in other areas of the country. There are particular segments of the population in Bolton that we try to target such as men and women who drink in the home (including older people), and younger people who are more likely to binge drink. We are also concerned that alcohol is perceived by many as a major cause of anti social and violent behaviour, rather than considering deeper underlying causes.

There is a strong correlation between social and economic deprivation and the harm that alcohol causes. The people who are most likely to suffer poor health and/or die from alcohol related conditions are also more likely to come from poorer backgrounds.

 So how does drinking in the modern day compare to the past?

Alcohol has affected different parts of society in different ways ever since there have been class divisions. In 1750 William Hogarth, produced his engraving of ‘Gin Lane’ which depicts a drunken mother surrounded by a scene of squalor. A year later, the Gin Acts give magistrates control over licensing pubs in Britain.

Nowadays there is much debate about the rise of cheap booze being sold in supermarkets and other outlets and campaigns to raise the unit cost of alcohol to prevent it being sold so cheaply.

Interestingly Hogarth also produced another alcohol themed engraving called Beer Street. Here we have a much more congenial and acceptable view of the use of alcohol in a more prosperous neighbourhood.

Not much has changed then – we still aspire to a society where alcohol is drunk in moderate amounts and not associated with health and other social harms but we continue to tolerate levels of deprivation that lead people to drink in very harmful ways.

 What does the future hold with the expected cuts to public funding?

In the short term public spending cuts are likely to lead to higher unemployment and greater poverty for those at the bottom of the socio-economic ladder.

We must do what we can to ensure that we provide advice about low risk drinking and alcohol services as efficiently as possible. The use of new digital technologies is part of that. We can potentially reach 100 people on a web site more cheaply than 10 who need to come into a doctor’s surgery to speak to a nurse.

 We must also campaign for legislation that supports a low risk drinking culture rather than one that is geared to maximising profit for the alcohol industry.

However we will always be swimming against the tide as long as the social conditions that underpin health inequalities continue to exist. So what we also must do is what Hogarth did and rail against the inequalities that drive so many people to drink at such levels in the first place.

So have you set yourself any personal challenges for alcohol awareness week?

I’m aiming to have two days with no drink at all but to savour a pint or two of real ale at the week-end. I aim to be below 22 units at the end of the week. And yes, I’ll use the alcohol measurement tool you’ve created for us!