Groggy Problems

Today, the NSW and ACT Alcohol Policy Alliance have launched their policies at Parliament House. This newly formed group is an alliance of 27 member organisations looking primarily at alcohol availability, community engagement and alcohol pricing and promotion. The 27 groups involved, ranging across the health, law enforcement, research and community sectors are:

1. Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education
2. Network of Alcohol and Drug Agencies
3. Darlinghurst Resident Action Group
4. Newcastle Community Drug Action Team
5. Police Association of NSW
6. Australian Medical Association NSW
7. Trauma Committee of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons
8. Public Health Association NSW Branch
9. Cancer Council NSW
10. National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre
11. Centre for Health Initiatives, University of Wollongong
12. Australasian College of Emergency Medicine
13. Jewish House Limited
14. Inspire Foundation
15. The Asia Pacific Centre for Crime Prevention Griffith University (Sydney)
16. University of Newcastle
17. Ulladulla Community Drug Action Team
18. Drug and Alcohol Research and Training Australia
19. Bondi Residents Association
20. Ted Noffs Foundation
21. St Vincent’s Hospital
22. Australian Drug Foundation
23. Health Services Union
24. Pedestrian Council of Australia
25. The Salvation Army NSW
26. Awabakal Newcastle Aboriginal Co Operative Ltd
27. The Royal Australasian College of Physicians

According to ABS statistics from 2007-2008, the number of 18+ Australians drinking to an extent considered at high risk for long-term health is over one quarter of the population (26.7%). Alcohol causes a range of health ailments and social consequence, some obvious, such as the alcohol-related violence that pops up around areas where large amounts of alcohol are consumed and some not as well known, such as the potential for developing psychological problems. Alcohol related problems were said to cost the nation $36 billion a year in 2010 by the Alcohol Education and Rehabilitation Foundation.

Nearly everyone has an anecdotal tale of an alcohol related incident, whether it be a violent confrontation witnessed or involved in at a pub or club, or an alcohol related health problem. It is by far the most widely available psychoactive recreational drugs, with the least regulation controlling the market. And it’s been receiving a lot of attention lately, with politicians looking to tackle some of the run-off effects of alcohol related problems, such as legislation introduced into Victorian Parliament yesterday looking to increase the punishment for anyone convicted of gross violence.

With all of the public debate about the problems of alcohol, alongside a renewed public interest in illicit drug policy, perhaps it is time to take a new look at the entire drug issue – including the legal drugs and pharmaceuticals. I’ve witnessed people on all sides of the debate standing up for their drug of choice, while demonising another. It seems to me that conversations of that sort are entirely missing the issue and marring the debate in the same cyclical black-and-white crap we’ve seen for far too long.

There are several points that seem most important to remember as we pursue this discourse:

1. The final point of control over any human is the human who will make an action. Although choices may be influenced by economic or legislative regulation, by education and marketing, in the end what an individual chooses to do is their choice and their’s only.
2. All things have inherent risks.
3. All will make mistakes.

We are chemical collections. The reason why drugs work is because they are similar to chemicals our body already makes and they therefore fit into receptor sites. The human relationship with mind alteration goes back to the dawn of civilisation and has been explored in many ways, especially through the consumption of plants and later, using chemical experimentation and refinement to induce effect.
We can’t stop people from experimenting with their consciousness and their experience of life. To an extent, I believe it should be encouraged as it seems that novel experience often leads to novel advancement of humankind.

However, with the pursuit of novel experience comes the potential for risks to translate into problems. NAAPA today provided analysis predicting 300 alcohol related deaths over summer in Australia. We also hear the stories of substance experimentation leading to health or psychological problems.
We know that prohibition doesn’t work. The United States experimented with alcohol prohibition from 1920-1933, which lead to a rise in crime, gave huge powers to the black market and didn’t reduce the problems associated with alcohol. The U.S.’s ‘War on Drugs’ and the similar subsequent laws across the world have been deemed a failure, which can be seen by the myriad of recent reports across the media, comments from public identities and by simply looking at the data, which show nothing has been made better by prohibitionist policy and the situation has become worse, somewhat mirroring the lessons that should have been learned from earlier dabbles in this sort of policy position.

NAAPA suggest that, “the problem should be dealt with by reducing availability and increasing prices.” These sorts of economic regulatory solutions seem appealing, as policy makers too often rely on an all pervasive, all powerful market. I am left wondering whether this sort of economic regulation actually helps people and society, whether it leads people to other intoxication choices, perhaps provided by an unregulated black market or by cheaper and perhaps more insidious alternatives and whether the underlying ethical position is sound.

Reducing substance related harms to the individual and community are a nearly universal goal. No one wants to see friends, family or community members spiral downward with the help of their chosen substance, and no one wants to see the flow on effects of substance influenced bad behaviour. But, I often find it bothering that the sorts of economic statistics thrown about the place relating to the costs of substance use/abuse seem to include an expected economic outcome from the humans involved.

Employees who report to work following a heavy drinking episode may be less productive than usual, an effect sometimes categorized as “presenteeism.” The costs of subpar performance resulting from alcohol consumption are difficult to measure but are believed by some to be more significant than the costs of absenteeism (European Alcohol and Health Forum, 2011; Goetzel et al., 2004).

– International Center for Alcohol Policy

It seems that growth of the economy and increasing productivity have become the underlying ethos of an exponential-pursuing global paradigm. Although I’m going down the slippery slope here, I begin to wonder when I hear logic like this how long until activities we currently consider normal and feel we have a right to are made to seem unproductive to the economy and ideologically fought against by those stuck in this current economic-ontology. And slipping down even further, I tin-foiled-hattedly ponder how long until every human’s actions can be measured, controlled and slotted together to operate like a finely oiled productive machine. “For the Hive!” is a favourite quote of a friend of mine.

I don’t really believe that such a thing would actually happen, but I do worry that the goal of productivity may be shadowing other human pursuits, such as leisure, exploration (internal and external), research, further education and so on.

With today’s launch of NAAPA, I hope that Australia can start to deal with the truly human detrimental effects of alcohol. The health problems, the violence and the destruction. I also hold high hopes that we can begin to engage in sensible, productive debate about other drug policies so that we can start to address the detrimental effects to humans caused potentially both by substances and policies.

But, I also hope that we can remember as a society that people will always want to take risks, and some of us will fall. And on the other side, the majority of us will use a variety of substances, including alcohol, for the positive benefits and personal enrichment we perceive it to bring to our lives.

Let’s try and help each other out, rather than control each other… how’s that for a plan?

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