Alcohol Abuse

Baroness Chisholm of Owlpen Excerpts

Thursday 30th March 2017 Grand Committee

[Baroness Chisholm of Owlpen (Con)]

My Lords, this is an important debate, and I thank the noble Lord, Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe, for initiating it.

A recent study in the south-west showed that one in three adults exceeds the permitted government guidelines and that 83% of at-risk drinkers see themselves as moderate or light drinkers, whereas 69% are not concerned about how much they drink. There appears to be a common assumption that the benchmark for too much alcohol is when control is lost on the occasional bender, reliance on alcohol is required to get through the day or a bad hangover is experienced. Few understand the risk to their health, their family or the wider community. High blood pressure, mental health, accidental injury, violence and liver disease are just a few health issues directly linked to alcohol. As the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, mentioned, liver disease is arguably one of the biggest health issues facing the NHS along with deep-seated serious health problems, and the harm is being done to a large extent in the privacy of people’s homes.

Alcohol admissions and related injuries put A&E departments under huge pressure. Estimates have suggested that three in every 10 patients attending A&E are there because of alcohol. People are calling ambulances like cabs to ferry them to hospital when they become incapacitated. Those who are not injured often just need to sleep it off in a place of safety, but they arrive in A&E by ambulance or cab or are taken there by friends. Those who have sustained injuries can be aggressive towards staff, leading to staff being vulnerable and of course adding to the difficulty of treating the injury.

Alcohol harm knows no boundaries. Its tentacles can affect anyone in a community—rich, poor, young, old, the well-educated and those who are not. What can be done? There is no easy solution. Perhaps the following could help towards people being more responsible about their drinking as well as cutting the cost to the NHS. A combination of price control and taxation would successfully target those who drink more of the cheapest and strongest alcohol products.

A comprehensive cultural change is required to educate young people towards activities that do not revolve around drinking. Is an advertising campaign the way forward to educate parents and families about the dangers? Parents play the biggest role in educating their children about the dangers of alcohol abuse. Parents should know who their children are hanging around with and make an effort to get to know the parents of their children’s friends. When parents are involved, they are more likely to be able to pick up the signs of any problems. Of course, that is the perfect scenario and, as we know, many children come from homes where good parenting is not the norm, so educators have a role to play.

Effective approaches include teaching students how to resist peer influences and improve life skills, involve families and provide students with the opportunities to get involved with positive experiences. There is no point in just lecturing on the dangers. That tends to cause most teenagers just to switch off. What programmes are available in schools? Is health and well-being part of the curriculum, particularly in primary schools where recent reports suggest that one child per week is being excluded for heavy drinking. Perhaps the alcohol industry should be asked to contribute towards the cost of these classes. What training are GPs and psychiatrists being given to recognise the signs of alcohol misuse?

The Nelson Trust, a drug and alcohol treatment centre in Gloucestershire, is talking with the local CCG to consider placing workers in A&E to target frequent visitors whose admissions are alcohol related. A senior nurse told the charity that local hospitals are doing 30 in-patient detoxes a month on individuals who have come into hospitals because of a fall or a gastro problem, for example, and who are found to be alcohol dependent. They require a 10-day in-patient stay only to go out and repeat the process. We are fortunate in this country to have experienced, successful charities involved in addiction. Let us have a joined-up approach and use their expertise in medical settings and educational facilities.

We all have a responsibility to ensure that alcohol is drunk in a responsible way. As an A&E consultant pointed out, it appears that people do not make plans at the end of an evening to get home safely or look after their friends. A whole department can be disrupted from just one drunk patient. The Government’s role is to address the problems caused by alcohol and to support people to stay healthy without unfairly affecting responsible drinkers and businesses.