WHO Global Status Report

The recently published WHO Global Status Report on Alcohol and Health 2011 is a further milestone in the Organisation’s efforts to monitor alcohol consumption, alcohol-related harm and policy responses worldwide.

Including information spanning 2004-2010, the Report’s three sections provide comparable global information on alcohol consumption, consequences of the harmful use of alcohol, and the policy responses.

For the purposes of the Report New Zealand is grouped with Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Japan, and Singapore into the Western Pacific Region (WPR) with our income status described as ‘high’.

While some specific data highlights New Zealand, more generally how we compare globally is referenced through a series of world maps and tables.

For instance, the Report puts worldwide per capita consumption of alcoholic beverages in 2005 as equalling 6.13 litres of pure alcohol for every person aged 15 years or older.

While large variations existed in adult18 years and over per capita consumption, developed countries, particularly the former Soviet Republic States led the way at more than 12.5 litres.

However, certain Southern Hemisphere nations – namely Australia and Argentina – and the Northern Hemisphere, were not far behind with adult per capita consumption levels of between 10-12.4 litres. New Zealand has a consumption level of 9.6 litres.

Medium levels were found in southern Africa, with Namibia and South Africa having the highest levels, and in North and South America.

Low consumption levels were noted in North Africa, sub-Saharan Africa, the Eastern Mediterranean region, southern Asia and the Indian Ocean. Regions representing large populations of the Islamic faith included high rates of abstention.

Abstention rates are low in high-income, high consumption countries, with rates of abstention in New Zealand less than 20 percent. Rates were higher in North African and South Asian countries with large Muslim populations, where female abstention rates were very high.

Interesting, despite widespread consumption, an even higher percentage of people currently do not drink at all, with almost half of all men and two thirds of women not consuming alcohol in the past year.

As well, New Zealand was among countries with about three quarters of the world’s population which revealed a stable five-year trend in recorded consumption. Estimates suggest a stable consumption trend in most regions, with increases in the African region and in South-East Asia.

While alcohol consumption and problems related to alcohol vary widely around the world, the consequences of alcohol misuse, including disease and death, remains significant in most countries.

Alcohol consumption is the world’s third largest risk factor for disease and disability and for middle-income countries is the greatest risk.

In 2004, 4.5% of the global burden of disease and injury was attributable to alcohol, namely 7.4% for men and 1.4% for women.

In New Zealand, the Report puts deaths attributable to alcohol at between 2-4.9 percent for 2004, with relatively high numbers of alcohol-attributable deaths in economically expanding middle-income countries, such as Brazil and China.

Heavy episodic drinking - defined as drinking at least 60 grams or more of pure alcohol on at least one occasion in the past seven days – showed New Zealand males in 2004 with a rate of 5-9.9 percent and females at under 5 percent.

Worldwide, about 11.5% of drinkers have weekly heavy episodic drinking occasions with men outnumbering women by four to one; men consistently engaged in hazardous drinking at much higher levels than women in all regions.

The Reports also believes that contrary to the belief of many people the health, safety and socioeconomic problems attributable to alcohol can be effectively reduced, citing numerous evidence-based alcohol policies and prevention programmes that have been shown to work.

“One of the most effective is raising alcohol prices by raising taxes. This has the added benefit of generating increased revenues. A recent analysis of 112 studies on the effects of alcohol tax increases affirmed that when taxes go up, drinking goes down, including among problem drinkers and youth12-24 years of age.,” the report states.

Implementing and enforcing legal drinking ages for the purchase and consumption of
alcohol is another effective way to reduce alcohol-attributable problems, as is the setting of maximum blood alcohol concentrations (BACs) for drivers and enforcing them with sobriety checkpoints and random breath testing.

“Yet, not enough countries use these and other effective policy options to prevent death, disease and injury attributable to alcohol consumption. Since 1999, when WHO first began to report on alcohol policies, at least 34 countries have adopted some type of formal policies. Restrictions on alcohol marketing and on drink–driving have increased but, in general, there are no clear trends on most preventive measures.

“A large proportion of countries, representing a high percentage of the global population, has weak alcohol policies and prevention programmes that do not protect the health and safety of the populace,” the Report concludes.

The recently published WHO Global Status Report on Alcohol and Health 2011 is available on: www.who.int/substance_abuse/publications/global_alcohol_report/en/