Alcohol ad bans proven to not reduce drinking
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Joseph Dinnage writes for CapX
Joseph wrote:
“This is the central conclusion of a paper published last week by the Institute of Economic Affairs. ‘Alcohol Advertising: What does the evidence show?’, examines the empirical evidence surrounding the popular public health theory that banning alcohol advertising will decrease overall consumption. Predictably, the nanny-statists’ kneejerk desire to prohibit does not stack up against the facts.
“A Cochrane Review from 2014, widely considered the gold standard of evidence-based policy research, found that there is ‘currently a lack of evidence for or against recommending the implementation of alcohol advertising restrictions‘. This is reflected in the numbers. Despite alcohol advertising in Britain falling by 10.8% between 1991 and 2001, consumption rose by 15.8%.
“If politicians want to get serious about tackling alcohol-related harm, market distortions and blanket bans are not the answer – and pretending that they are will only perpetuate the difficulties that problem drinkers face. As with any group, treating drinkers as a homogenous bloc is misleading and disregards the vast fluctuation in levels of use and associated social issues.”
You can read the full article here.