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Home | Alcohol Concern in action | Campaigning | Alcohol Awareness Week

Alcohol Awareness Week 2011

Alcohol Awareness Week ran from 14-20 November 2011

Alcohol Awareness Week is an Alcohol Concern initiative in collaboration with regional and national health groups Balance (North East), Our Life and Drink Wise North West (North West), Alcohol Focus Scotland, Alcohol Action Ireland and Alcohol Concern Cymru (Wales).

Local action

Alcohol Awareness Week is first and foremost a grassroots campaign, carried out by local and regional groups and organisations to raise the awareness of the public to the social and health issues surrounding alcohol. It tells people what they can do to make a difference in their own lives and those of their friends and family, and how they can campaign locally and nationally.

To highlight the need for a public commitment to reduction in alcohol harm as reflected in the call to action, we encouraged people around the country to take part in a national conversation based on two questions:

• Is the social cost of alcohol too high?
• What is a drink problem?

Awareness Week 2011 saw a huge range of activities across the country. Click here to open a map, and do get in touch with us if you were involved in events which should be included.

The Charter for a world free of alcohol harm

Awareness Week also has a national dimension. At a time when there is an apparent lack of commitment to making a real impact on alcohol harm in England, Alcohol Concern decided to make the national focus of Alcohol Awareness Week 2011 the launch of the Charter for a world free of alcohol harm, using the World Health Organisation's statement on alcohol as the basis for a declaration setting out four points which form a mission statement for Alcohol Concern.

The Charter provides the principles on which all of our work is based, and during Awareness Week we also made a Call for Action to remind policymakers that, while high quality information on alcohol harm is essential, information on its own is insufficient to make a significant impact on problem drinking. The result is that resource-stretched services are left to cope with the results.

Click here for the Charter main page.

Click here for the press release.

The future of alcohol services in the reformed NHS

Alcohol Concern held a series of roundtable discussions on the future of alcohol services in the reformed NHS at the three main autumn political party conferences, and we presented the findings of these discussions to Government during Alcohol Awareness Week.

At the party conferences in Liverpool, Birmingham and Manchester we decided to gather key intelligence from commissioners, clinicians, public health officials, councillors and MPs, all of whom have front-line experience of dealing with the challenge of alcohol misuse at a local level. We found out the key challenges they face and the opportunities for action they see for the Alcohol Strategy.

Four main recommendations emerged:

• National Action: Government prioritisation of the prevention, identification and treatment of alcohol misuse.
• National Action: Government action to tackle the affordability, availability and advertising of alcohol.
• Local leadership and integration: Ensuring that local services are provided for people who misuse alcohol.
• Local Empowerment: Government action to give councillors greater local powers over licensing and planning.

Click here to read or download the briefing report.

Youth advertising standards advisory group

To coincide with Alcohol Awareness Week, Alcohol Concern's youth advertising standards group released its first report, looking at whether alcohol advertising actually does conform to the code set up to regulate it.

Click here for the press release.

Click here to download the report.

Useful links

These links provide further information on the themes for the the national conversation that took place during Awareness Week.

Is the social cost of alcohol too high?

• Read our key alcohol statistics and facts.
• Find out what the local situation is at the interactive Local alcohol profiles for England (LAPE) website.
• Go to the National statistics on alcohol, 2011.
• Read our factsheet on alcohol and the night-time economy.

What is a drink problem?

• Get information about safe levels of drinking at the Down your drink website.
• Read a recent BBC article reviewing the key health issues relating to alcohol misuse: What damage does alcohol do to our bodies?
• Read the Royal College of Psychiatrists' leaflet Alcohol: our favourite drug.
• Is the social cost of alcohol too high?
• What is a drink problem?
• To help people think about their level of drinking, Alcohol Concern's poster on drink strength What's in your drink? can be downloaded Download English version.Download dual Welsh/English version

Alcohol Concern is grateful for the support of Lundbeck UK in funding the administrative and logistical support for the roundtable meetings looking at the future of alcohol services in the reformed NHS. Lundbeck is an ethical research-based pharmaceutical company specialising in diseases of the central nervous system.