Pricing policy linked to fall in alcohol deaths in Scotland

Scotland’s pioneering policy of minimum pricing for alcohol has been linked to a 13% drop in deaths from alcohol consumption, and hundreds fewer hospitalisations, according to a study.

The research was observational, so cannot prove conclusively that the significant fall in deaths was due to the minimum unit pricing (MUP) policy. However, experts said the study provided the clearest signal to date that the policy has reduced the harm caused by alcohol in Scotland.

“Minimum unit pricing was introduced to save lives, and this latest report shows it is doing just that,” said Dr Alastair MacGilchrist, the chair of clinician partnership at Scottish Health Action on Alcohol Problems.

In May 2018, the Scottish government introduced legislation implementing a minimum price of 50p per unit of alcohol. The research, published in the Lancet, suggests it has been associated with about 150 fewer deaths a year on average.

Researchers from Public Health Scotland, the University of Glasgow and the University of Queensland, Australia, said there was a “significant” 13.4% reduction in deaths wholly attributable to alcohol consumption compared with an estimate of the deaths that would have occurred had the legislation not been implemented.

There was also a 4.1% reduction in hospitalisations for conditions wholly attributable to alcohol consumption, equivalent to avoiding 411 hospitalisations a year on average.

“The findings highlight that the largest reductions were found for males, and for those living in the 40% most deprived areas, groups which are known to experience disproportionally high levels of alcohol health harms in Scotland,” said Dr Grant Wyper of Public Health Scotland.

The authors acknowledged some limitations to the study, including that there was an impact on hospital capacity and attendance during the Covid pandemic, which increased the uncertainty of the findings related to hospitalisations.

But Daniel Mackay, a professor of public health informatics at the University of Glasgow, said: “The methods we used in this study allow us to be confident that the reduction in alcohol health harms we’ve shown is due to the introduction of MUP, rather than some other factor.”

The Scottish parliament will vote before May next year on whether MUP will continue.