Chamber
Meeting of the Parliament 29 May 2024
29 May 2024 · S6 · Meeting of the Parliament
Item of business
Portfolio Question Time
Alcohol Harm (Cost)
NHS Recovery, Health and Social Care
The Scottish Government is determined to reduce alcohol-related harm, including by increasing the minimum unit price and through the record investment in treatment services that it provided in 2023-24. In 2023, the Social Market Foundation, based on research that was carried out by the York Health Economics Consortium in 2010 and the University of Aberdeen in 2012, estimated that the alcohol-related societal and economic costs in Scotland in 2021-22 could have amounted to between approximately £5 billion to £10 billion annually. That research also estimates that the health and social care-related societal costs arising from alcohol use in Scotland could be between £500 million and £700 million annually.
In the same item of business
8. Monica Lennon (Central Scotland) (Lab)
Lab
To ask the Scottish Government what estimate it has made of the total annual cost of alcohol harm in Scotland, including to the national health service and h...
The Minister for Drugs and Alcohol Policy (Christina McKelvie)
SNP
The Scottish Government is determined to reduce alcohol-related harm, including by increasing the minimum unit price and through the record investment in tre...
Monica Lennon
Lab
Experts and campaigners rightly want more preventative action, including minimum unit pricing uprating annually, restrictions on harmful alcohol marketing, a...
Christina McKelvie
SNP
We are working with a number of organisations across the board to look at how we tackle alcohol harm in Scotland. I am happy to share that information with M...
The Deputy Presiding Officer
SNP
That concludes portfolio question time. There will be a brief pause to allow members to change positions, should they so wish.