Crackdown: Waitemata¯ DHB joins booze battle
Hiking the price of booze and the legal purchase age are crucial to combating the growing burden of alcoholrelated health conditions. That’s according to the Waitemata¯ District Health Board, which has joined other health boards in endorsing a position on alcohol harm.
It’s calling for restrictions on the availability of alcohol, increasing the minimum legal purchase age and price of booze.
Health officials are also wanting a reduction of alcohol advertising, promotion and sponsorship, along with drink-driving countermeasures.
Nearly one in six adults aged 15 years and over drink hazardously within Waitematã DHB’s boundary.
For Mãori it’s far higher ( 28 per cent) compared with non-Mãori (20 per cent).
“Hazardous and harmful alcoholuse is identified as a major contributor to inequities and is amenable to healthy public policy,” the DHB said in its statement.
The DHB said alcohol was not an ordinary commodity, it was an intoxicant, a toxin and an addictive psychotropic drug.
“Alcohol has been normalised and largely accepted by society and causes more harm than any other drug in society.”
The stance adds to growing calls by health boards to address the environment people live in, in order to improve their health.
Canterbury DHB congratulated the Waitemata¯ board on Twitter, saying: “It’s great to see other health systems recognising how alcohol-harm impacts the health of our communities.”
Waitemata¯ DHB pointed to research showing hazardous alcoholuse contributed to large physical and mental ill-health, social and economic burdens in New Zealand and globally, with effects extending across sectors.
“In New Zealand, inequitable outcomes are apparent with men, Mãori, young people and those living in more socio-economically deprived areas at higher risk of alcohol-related harm.”
This year, the Herald reported that hazardous drinking rates jumped during the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown last year.
Ministry of Health emergency department attendances data showed that in May 2020 there were 200 more visits compared with the year earlier, with roughly 400 more visits in both June and July.