Trade blamed for alcoholism
In a scathing attack a leading doctor has blamed the drinks industry for the increases in alcoholism.
Colin Drummond, an expert on addiction at St George's medical school in London, claimed over the last 12 years there has been a 32 per cent increase in alcohol abuse by 18 to 24-year-olds while abuse by young women over the same period has increased by a massive 70 per cent.
The blame, he says, should be laid at the door of the drinks industry.
"I don't think it is just the 'Bridget Jones' phenomenon," he said.
"The drinks industry has spent a lot of money making alcoholic drinks more attractive to women and making pubs more attractive."
He believes the government should raise the drinking limit to 21, have tighter controls on alcohol labelling and raise prices.
Mark Hastings, spokesman for the British Beer & Pub Association, said: "By increasing the drinking age to 21 all you do is drive drinking outside the controlled environment of pubs and bars.
"There is also absolutely no evidence that price is related to alcohol consumption.
"The fact is that the price of alcohol has risen steadily over the last few years and so has consumption."
Jean Coussins, chief executive of The Portman Group, said: "Control policies like raising the minimum purchase age and introducing health warning labels have been shown time and time again not to work and sometimes have the opposite of their desired effect.
"What we need are not more restrictive laws but better enforcement of existing laws. For example, it is already illegal for a licensee to sell alcohol to someone already intoxicated, and this law should be more rigorously enforced.
"It is also vital that the industry sticks to the spirit as well as the letter of all advertising and marketing codes and that regulators enforce the rules more strongly.
"It is important that the regulators are stringent in their application of the codes and that the drinks industry exercises self-restraint in its advertising."
Dr Drummond made his comments this week at the British Association science festival in Salford, Greater Manchester.
