IHRA hosted an “Expert Meeting” in Copenhagen, Denmark to discuss alcohol related problems in the city and how these could be reduced through pragmatic and realistic harm reduction interventions. The meeting was part of IHRA’s “Alcohol and the City” project – a multi-city project aimed at demonstrating how practical and realistic alcohol harm reduction interventions can be managed at a city level. The meeting aimed to bring together all of the key stakeholders in Copenhagen (such as the police, researchers, practitioners, politicians, campaigners, youth workers, the alcohol industry, and medical staff), and agree a “wish list” of harm reduction interventions and actions that could be instigated in the city.
Cities are crucial to effective alcohol harm reduction. They are where alcohol consumption is often concentrated (with both positive and negative consequences), and are where most of the agencies which can influence alcohol-related behaviours and harms actually operate. The positive aspects of alcohol use include socialising, pleasure and entertainment, but the well-documented negative aspects include crime, social nuisance and health problems. Therefore, as cities without alcohol are difficult to imagine in Western society, the challenge is to create a local drinking environment in which the benefits of alcohol are maximised, and the harms minimised.
The Alcohol and the City project was created to investigate whether or not city-wide alcohol harm-reduction strategies were feasible. Who should be consulted about such a strategy? How would a strategy operate? Who would manage it? Most importantly, however, the key question of the project was whether or not a strategy of this kind could have a positive impact on the local drinking environment.
In Copenhagen, IHRA organised an initial stakeholder consultation in May 2006, where it was agreed to conduct some “rapid assessment” research in the city in order to gain a fuller picture of alcohol patterns, contexts and problems in the Danish capital. The Expert Meeting in October 2006 was a follow-up to this research. IHRA gathered the key stakeholders together for this meeting to listen to presentations about alcohol harm reduction, discuss the situation in Copenhagen, and devise a wish list of possible interventions that were relevant to the city. The eventual list for Copenhagen included server training schemes (to help prevent bars serving to underage or intoxicated patrons), and study-visits to Scotland to share information and best practice.
The project is supported by a donation from Diageo, as part of their ongoing commitment to the responsible use of their products. More information will be made available when the IHRA website is re-launched in the coming months. In the meantime, please feel free to contact IHRA for more information on the Alcohol and the City project, to get involved in the project in the target cities above, or to express an interest in the project on behalf of your city.
