The Alcohol Industry Is No Ordinary Stakeholder: A Response to the Commentaries on Mitchell and McCambridge (2023)

Citation

Mitchell G (2023) The Alcohol Industry Is No Ordinary Stakeholder: A Response to the Commentaries on Mitchell and McCambridge (2023). Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs, 84 (2), pp. 339-339. https://doi.org/10.15288/jsad.23-00090

Abstract
First paragraph: I thank sassi (2023) for taking the time to reflect on the production of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) report on alcohol (Sassi, 2015). The commitment from Sassi and colleagues to publishing an evidence-based report is clear, as are the political challenges faced in producing it. Sassi describes a range of stakeholders resisting the report's original title, Drinking Lives Away, and notes that it would not have been changed if the complaints came only from the alcohol industry. This makes a distinction between industry and other stakeholders that our findings do not support. As we report in the article, a National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) senior leader advised a Diageo (one of the world's largest alcohol producers) representative on how to frame their concerns about the report to the OECD, including the title. Once it became clear that the title was going to be changed, the NIAAA official asked the Diageo representative for their “thoughts” on an alternative. Strikingly, in this case the NIAAA appeared to be supporting the alcohol industry's lobbying efforts.

Journal
Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs: Volume 84, Issue 2

People

Dr Gemma Mitchell

ISMH Hastings Research Fellow, Institute for Social Marketing