The 1st of the month marked two years since the introduction of Scotland's Minimum Unit Pricing (MUP) after a long-running legal battle led by sections of the alcohol industry.
The Institute of Alcohol Studies (IAS) released a briefing Minimum Unit Pricing in Scotland: What we know so far about its effects on consumption and health harms [pdf]. The executive summary states "media reports have been mixed, with some claiming the policy has been a success and others claiming it has been a failure. This briefing attempts to summarise this evidence to draw conclusions about the impact of MUP based on what we know so far."
The official Monitoring and Evaluating Scotland's Alcohol Strategy (MESAS) Twitter account also released a thread summarising some of the key findings to date spanning a range of impact evaluations. Alcohol Focus Scotland's Alison Douglas called for a long-term focus on alcohol in a blog on MUP and future policy opportunities.
A further component of the evaluation has since been released assessing practitioner's views on MUP's potential role in protecting children and young people. Broadly, whilst practitioners were largely supportive of MUP, the most visible impacts of alcohol harm are evident amongst more severely dependent drinkers, thus MUP was seen as of limited value in this context. Indeed, MUP advocates have often sought to highlight that MUP gains are expected across a larger group of heavy but not severely dependent drinkers.
Further reports are expected in the coming months. See here for the MUP evaluation timeline.
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