Alcohol prevention on the agenda of the World Health Assembly

The 61st session of the World Health Assembly (WHA) is taking place in Geneva this week. Health ministers, diplomats and health experts from the members states of the World Health Organization (WHO) are discussing a wide range of public health issues, eg. the problem of non-communicable diseases. In agenda item A61/13 the assembly will discuss strategies to reduce the harmful consumption of alcohol. This is expected to take place Wednesday 21st and Thursday 22nd of May.

The Report from the secretariat to this issue can be downloaded here.

The Executive Board of the WHO has recommended to the WHA to adopt a global strategy to reduce alcohol-related harm. The proposed resolution can be downloaded here.

The idea of such a global strategy seems to have broad support from the member states, but there is one very controversial issue i the draft text, namely the role of the alcohol industry (economic operators) in formulation of alcohol policies.