The Office of the Provincial Health Officer on Wednesday released Living Well, Drinking Less: Reducing Alcohol Harms in BC, a report documenting alcohol's impact on British Columbians that drew on research expertise and data from the University of Victoria's (UVic) Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research (CISUR).
"In BC, alcohol use remains well above the national average and a significant source of costs and harms in our province," says Tim Naimi, CISUR director. "It was a pleasure to work with Dr. Bonnie Henry and her office on this report, and we applaud the provincial health officer and her team for taking a detailed look at this important public-health issue."
The report draws on data from various CISUR projects and studies, including the BC Alcohol and Other Drugs Monitoring Project, the Canadian Alcohol Policy Evaluation, and Canadian Substance Use Costs and Harms. CISUR researchers were consulted periodically throughout the report process, and the report launch was held at UVic, with Naimi offering remarks. This is the first time BC's health officer has issued a report on alcohol since 2008.
The report includes six recommendations for government from the provincial health officer, including upholding obligations to First Nations, Métis and Inuit people; implementing minimum unit pricing and warning labels for alcohol; and developing a provincial alcohol strategy.
"Many of these recommendations are ones we have made in the Canadian Alcohol Policy Evaluation of BC," says Naimi. "In particular, updating BC's policies around minimum prices would save the most lives and lower BC's budget deficit, and developing a provincial alcohol strategy would help pave the way for stronger public-health-oriented alcohol policies, which we have seen in jurisdictions like Northwest Territories and Newfoundland in recent years."
