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and books about human biology,’ he says. ‘I was interested originally in being a
hospital doctor, a rheumatologist.’ That was before his ‘light-bulb moment’,
however. ‘I was cycling along the Walworth Road and I saw a plaque on the wall of
a local government building that said “the health of the people is the highest
law” – a famous quote from Cicero, although I didn’t know at the time. I got
interested in public health and the whole business of prevention, so I switched
from clinical medicine to social medicine, as it was then called.’
After ten years at the Health Education Council he helped to set up the
National Heart Forum and Heartbeat Wales, before going on to head up public
health in Southwark. He’s also well known for his appearances on TV, Radio 4
and LBC, as well as the weekly doctor’s column he wrote for
Woman
magazine
for 17 years and several books on health issues.
These days he chairs a charity called Best Beginnings that works to reach
underprivileged parents through social media – ‘obviously alcohol and drugs are
very relevant to that,’ he says – and is a trustee of Alcohol Research UK, which gives
out around £500,000 every year to fund research into reducing alcohol harm.
On that note, the government’s consultation on minimum pricing closes this
week – despite opposition in the cabinet and threats of a legal challenge from
the industry does he think we’ll see a minimum price implemented in England?
‘I think we will – there are ways around the EU rules and regulations, and I think
a pressing public health benefit is an important aspect that might let us get
round the legal objections. The Scots are pretty optimistic that they can see this
through, and I think England and Wales will follow pretty quickly, with Northern
Ireland interested too, but obviously there’s a big issue about the price.’
Would he be happy with the 45p the government seems to favour? ‘I think
50p’s more sensible, and a key issue is obviously to try to prevent cross-border
differences. It would be kind of crazy to have Scotland at 50p and England and
Wales at 45 – it just wouldn’t make sense. The objection that’s often been
raised is that it would be penalising sensible drinkers who are less well off, but
the difference between 45 and 50p would be pretty small in that respect.’
*****
.
According to the chief medical officer’s annual report, deaths from cirrhosis and
chronic liver disease rose by 20 per cent among under-65s in England between
2000 and 2009, at the same time as they fell in 14 other EU countries (
DDN
,
December 2012, page 4). Is part of the problem simply that there’s an ingrained
drinking culture here that will be very hard to change, no matter what
legislation is imposed, and the industry will always do its best to exploit that?
‘There certainly is a culture that will be hard to change, but people focus on
the drinking culture among the young – there’s also a pretty big marketing
exercise aimed at older, more staid people tippling quietly in front of the telly
with a bottle of wine,’ he says.
‘At the moment the government proposes “working with” the Portman
Group or advertising standards, all very loosely worded, all sort of cosy and not
making any real impact. Although there’s some self-imposed regulation around
TV advertising, that’s not great and there’s still ways to get through those
loopholes, but there’s really nothing much at all around social media. That’s
where the big growth area is in marketing – along with all the sponsorship and
partnership stuff around music venues – pushing the brands, creating the image
that alcohol makes you glamorous and sexy and successful and all the rest of it.
We need to find ways of getting into that.’
Speaking of marketing, what did he make of the ‘responsibility deal’ with the
industry? (
DDN
, April 2011, page 4). ‘Too slow, too soft, and they’re only
negotiating with part of the industry, anyway – OK there are quite a few big
players in there, but there are quite a few who aren’t in that negotiation. I don’t
think it’s the right way to go about it.’
Does it help that the media can often misrepresent the issues, as happened
to some extent with minimum pricing? ‘The difficulty is getting the balance in
there, and getting the press to cover the boring facts,’ he says. ‘The journalists
who do actually take an interest on the whole try to look at it as responsibly as
they can – the problem then lies with the editors who decide what stories
they’re going to give prominence to. It’s very hard to get them to change their
tune because obviously they’re trying to sell papers and get the online hits.
‘What the health lobby can try to do is get the stories out – from research,
conferences and seminars, reports and reviews – which do provide the balance and
the evidence to counter the other stuff. You just hope that it gets picked up.’
DDN
alcoholresearchuk.org
www.bestbeginnings.org.uk
‘People focus on the
drinking culture among
the young — there’s also a
pretty big marketing
exercise aimed at older,
more staid people tippling
quietly in front of the telly
with a bottle of wine.’
February 2013 |
drinkanddrugsnews
| 19
www.drinkanddrugsnews.com
Profile |
Alan Maryon Davis
hy attitude