Government must take unpopular decisions to reduce alcohol consumption

Britain “has reached a point where it is necessary and urgent to call time on runaway alcohol consumption,” a report on drinking trends says. The report, by the Academy of Medical Sciences, calls on the government to take immediate measures not only to stop the rise in alcohol consumption but to cut drinking to 1970 levels, a reduction of 33%.

The report draws widely on recent European research on the effects of alcohol on public health. Much of the same research was reviewed in the recent interim analytical report by the alcohol harm reduction project of the prime minister's …