The Alcohol Alert Podcast

This month we’re joined by Professors Katherine Smith (University of Strathclyde) and Jeff Collin (University of Edinburgh) to discuss their citizens’ juries on alcohol, tobacco and unhealthy food in Glasgow, Wakefield and Doncaster. We explore the idea of deliberative democracy, why citizens’ juries can produce very different results from traditional public opinion polling, and what happens when...

This month we’re joined by Ailsa Rutter, Director of Fresh and Balance, the northeast England programme tackling tobacco and alcohol harm. Ailsa shares the deeply personal story behind her career – including nursing her father through smoking-related COPD after he became addicted as a child – and reflects on the history of tobacco control, from the 1962 Royal College of Physicians report to today’...

This month we’re joined by Peter Roderick, Director of Public Health for the City of York, for a wide-ranging conversation on what the job really involves – from advocating for marginalised communities to steering a local system through political change. We dig into the rise of the ‘commercial determinants of health’ agenda, why the alcohol, gambling and food industries increasingly find themselve...

This year marks 20 years since the founding of Scottish Health Action on Alcohol Problems (SHAAP), and we sat down with chair Dr Alastair MacGilchrist and founding member Dr Lesley Graham to trace its history – from spotting Scotland’s alcohol death rate spiralling in the early 2000s, to becoming a driving clinical voice behind the world’s first minimum unit pricing law. We hear how SHAAP built th...

Cancer Prevention Action Week in June put a spotlight on one of public health’s most stubborn problems: the gap between what the science says about cancer and what the public actually knows, including on alcohol and cancer. Melissa Dando from the World Cancer Research Fund explains the scale of the challenge: “Alcohol is a Group 1 carcinogen - the same category as tobacco and asbestos - and it’s l...

On this month’s Alcohol Alert podcast, we spoke to Professor Nicholas Carah about the fast-evolving world of digital alcohol marketing - and why it matters. As debates intensify globally around social media regulation and even bans for young people, the conversation couldn’t be more timely. Professor Carah explains how digital platforms have transformed marketing into something far more powerful a...

This month on the Alcohol Alert Podcast we were joined by Laura Cury from ACT Health Promotion in Brazil and Emma Thompson from IAS and the University of Edinburgh to reflect on the Global Alcohol Policy Conference (GAPC), held for the first time in Latin America. They discussed the momentum built around Brazil’s tax reform and its pioneering conflict of interest framework, the conference’s wide-r...

On this month’s podcast we spoke to Dr Damon Morris, Research Fellow at the Sheffield Addictions Research Group, about his latest paper that looked at the economic impact of a reduction in spending on unhealthy products. The research has dealt a significant blow to the alcohol, tobacco, and gambling industries’ core economic argument against regulation, finding that the sector’s claims that reduce...

On this month’s podcast we spoke to Dr Hugo Jobst, Dr Seonaid Anderson, and Allan Houston from Humanising Healthcare about their Conversation Café programme, which brings medical students together with people who have lived experience of addiction and recovery to change the culture of addiction medicine. Through small, round-table discussions, students hear directly from people in recovery, explor...

On this month’s podcast, we spoke to Luca Straker, Campaigns Manager at the road safety charity Brake. Luca welcomed the strategy, but highlighted that there needs to be more support for victims and families of those killed or injured in road collisions. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit instalcstud.substack.co...

In our latest podcast we spoke to Professor Niamh Fitzgerald and Dr James Nicholls of the University of Stirling about the UK government’s recent alcohol licensing Taskforce and its proposed reforms. We discussed the implications of the proposals for public health, local accountability, and the hospitality industry, and explored why economic growth arguments are being prioritised over health consi...

On this month’s podcast we spoke to Dr Jamie O’Halloran, senior research fellow at the influential progressive think tank IPPR, the Institute for Public Policy Research. We discussed their new report Taking Stock: Counting the economic costs of alcohol harm , which looks at the impact of alcohol harm on people’s productivity at work. We also spoke about why the public health economic arguments can...

On this month’s podcast we spoke to Dr Katherine Severi, IAS’s Chief Executive, and Karen Biggs, Chief Executive of treatment provider Phoenix Futures, about IAS’s forthcoming report: A healthier future: A long-term vision to tackle alcohol harm in the UK, due to be published in October. We discussed why a long-term strategy is urgently needed, the ambitious targets set out in the report, and how...

This month’s episode of the Alcohol Alert Podcast is a special cross-post from The Alcohol Debate Podcast , hosted by alcohol-freedom coach Tabbin Almond. In this episode, Tabbin is joined by Jem Roberts, Head of External Affairs at the Institute of Alcohol Studies, for a wide-ranging discussion on alcohol policy in the UK and Ireland. From Ireland’s world-first alcohol labelling law and its recen...

On this month's podcast we spoke to Professor Julia Sinclair and Arlene Copland about Alcohol Care Teams – the small but vital hospital teams supporting patients with complex alcohol problems. They explained how ACTs not only manage alcohol withdrawal, but also build trust with vulnerable patients, advocate across departments, and link people to the wider support they need. Despite clear evidence...

Why are young people drinking less? 🎵 podcast feature 🎵 On this month’s podcast we spoke to Professor John Holmes, University of Sheffield, and Amy Pennay, La Trobe University, about their new book: Young People, Alcohol, and Risk: A Culture of Caution . We discussed the decline in young people's drinking; whether this is continuing into adulthood; factors influencing this decline; and a why thi...

In our latest podcast Dr Will Haydock, Executive Director of Collective Voice, sheds light on alcohol treatment services in England. Representing an alliance of charities supporting people with alcohol and other drug issues, Haydock emphasises that free treatment is available in every local area – yet awareness remains low. He discusses barriers like stigma and the misperception that support is co...

In our latest podcast, Dr Megan Cook of La Trobe University discusses alcohol’s overlooked environmental impact. Dr Cook explores how alcohol production exacerbates climate harms, from water scarcity to packaging waste, and highlights the industry's "greenwashing" through corporate social responsibility campaigns. She argues that: "If we reduce alcohol consumption for health reasons, that’s going...

On this month’s podcast we spoke to Florence Berteletti and Anamaria Suciu, who work for the European Alcohol Policy Alliance, or Eurocare. We spoke about levels of alcohol harm in Europe, the crucial role the EU plays in shaping the alcohol policy landscape, and lessons we can learn from tobacco control about how to counter powerful lobbying by the alcohol industry. “Because even if we are David...

On this month’s podcast we spoke to Tabbin Almond, alcohol-freedom coach and author of the recent book: ‘Bottling Up Trouble: How alcohol is harming your business... and what to do about it’ . Tabbin shares insights from her work helping people change their relationship with alcohol. We discussed the pro-alcohol workplace culture, its impact on employees and businesses, and the need for structural...

In this episode, we dive into the history, structure, and impact of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA). Our guests, Tim, a long-standing member and trustee on the General Service Board, and Dr Kieran Moriarty, founder of Alcohol Care Teams and AA trustee, share their insights into the organisation’s role in supporting individuals struggling with alcohol dependence. Tim outlines AA’s origins in 1935, its fo...

On this month’s podcast we spoke to Will Prochaska, Leader of the Coalition to End Gambling Ads and former Chief Executive of the charity Gambling with Lives. We discussed: * What the gambling world looks like. * The harms associated with gambling. * Why New Labour’s liberalisation of gambling was "one of the worst things we did as a government" according to Alastair Campbell. * The many similarit...

On this month's podcast we spoke to Dr Aveek Bhattacharya about the decisions taken on alcohol duty in Labour's first Budget in 14 years. We discussed the positives and negatives of the decisions, whether Labour could and should have been more radical, how duty should be structured to cover the cost of alcohol harm, and whether public health groups should have welcomed the decision. This is a publ...

False equivalence and ‘empty rhetoric’ 🎵 podcast feature 🎵 The Institute of Alcohol Studies (IAS) was established in 1983 by the United Kingdom Temperance Alliance, UKTA, previously the United Kingdom Alliance. The UKTA changed its name to the Alliance House Foundation (AHF) in 2003, from which IAS receives most of its funding. IAS has always been transparent about its background and funding. Th...

In this month's podcast we spoke to Alfie Slade, Government Affairs Lead at the Obesity Health Alliance (OHA), about a new report called Killer Tactics. The report was developed by the OHA alongside the Alcohol Health Alliance and Action on Smoking and Health, and calls for MPs to reject corporate hospitality from these unhealthy product industries. The report shares the common tactics used by the...