Want people to temper their drinking habits? Then ditch the carrot and reach for the stick. Raise prices, reduce availability of booze and block marketing of alcohol to young people. That’s the stern message to the UK and other governments from independent UK think tank the Nuffield Council on Bioethics, which published a report on 13 November examining the circumstances under which “nanny state” policies might be justified.
“At present the UK government is trying to encourage a sensible drinking culture,” says John Krebs, chairman of the committee that wrote the report. “But walk through ‘vomit alley’ in central Oxford on a Saturday night and you…
