Addiction prevention Higher alcohol prices demanded

Expert demands significantly higher prices for alcohol

13/10/2014

DHS managing director Raphael Gaßmann calls referring to the addiction report of the Federal Government significantly higher prices for alcoholic drinks as well as a prohibition of advertising for spirits and tobacco, in order to get phenomena like the coma running under control.

According to the Federal Government's addiction report, there were more than 26,000 cases last year in which 10 to 20-year-olds had to be treated in hospitals due to alcohol consumption. In addition, Germany is the per capita consumption in the European comparison with 9.6 liters of alcohol at the top. In addition, there are 110,000 deaths annually that are directly related to tobacco consumption. Experts agree that prevention can only be successful if the interplay of behavioral prevention (eg personal drug handling) and proportionality prevention (eg regulatory framework governing, for example, distribution and sale of addictive substances) is balanced.

More behavioral prevention can not replace the impact of relative prevention. Only under suitable conditions can the behavioral prevention measures initiated by the specialist agencies for addiction prevention work, the DHS already stated in a press release dated 12.08.2014.

„Legal addictive substances should also not be available 24 hours a day, seven days a week at any corner“, said DHS CEO Raphael Gaßmann in the run-up to a three-day conference on addiction prevention in Potsdam opposite the dpa.

In the so-called „alcopops“ the price increases had a positive effect. Background is the lack of taxation of wine, the very moderate tax on beer and the high taxation of spirits. Therefore, demand the DHS „a uniform levy on the brandy level“, so Gassmann. Moreover, the tight financial budgeting means that DHS would focus almost exclusively on the problem areas of smoking and alcohol, although illicit drugs continue to be a huge problem.

Funding for addiction prevention needs to be improved
Addiction prevention, according to the press release of DHS affects all areas of society and is a task of society as a whole. Therefore, must „The funding of addiction prevention is provided on a broad basis in federal, state and local governments and a variety of actors, i.a. Also - in addition to the statutory health insurance - private health insurance include“. Legal solutions would be hardly strained by the policy, it usually remains only lip-service, the health insurance would be left alone with the problem. „Here we need a change of direction“, so the DHS managing director to the dpa. (Jp)