The volume of alcohol sold per adult in Scotland in 2018 has fallen to its lowest level since 1994.
The first expert analysis of data, just over a year since Scotland became the first country in the world to introduce minimum unit pricing, shows a 3% fall in alcohol sales per adult in Scotland from the previous year.
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The volume of alcohol sold per adult in Scotland, compared to England and Wales, represented the smallest gap since 2002.
Results of the NHS Health Scotland Monitoring and Evaluating Scotland’s Alcohol Strategy (MESAS) programme found that the volume of alcohol sold per adult in Scotland was 9% higher than in England and Wales, where 9.1 litres was sold per adult.
On 1 May 2018 Scotland brought into force legislation setting a minimum 50 pence per unit price to tackle the harm caused by cheap, high strength alcohol.
Health Secretary Jeane Freeman said:
“This is a promising start following our world-leading action to introduce minimum unit pricing, and with this 3% fall we are moving in the right direction.
“There are, on average, 22 alcohol-specific deaths every week in Scotland, and 683 hospital admissions, and behind every one of these statistics is a person, a family, and a community badly affected by alcohol harm.
“Given the clear and proven link between consumption and harm, minimum unit pricing is the most effective and efficient way to tackle the cheap, high strength alcohol that causes so much harm to so many families.”
