About the campaign
Here you will find background information on the National Binge Drinking Strategy.
- The National Binge Drinking Campaign
- Who is the Indigenous campaign for?
- The Indigenous focus
- Other components of the National Binge Drinking Strategy
- Background
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The National Binge Drinking Campaign
On 10 March 2008, the Australian Government announced the $53.5 million National Binge Drinking Strategy to address the high levels of binge drinking among young Australians. Binge drinking among young people is a community wide problem that demands a community wide response, including an emphasis on young people taking greater personal responsibility for their behaviour.The Campaign, ‘Don’t turn a night out into a nightmare’ launched in November 2008. It includes advertising, public relations and sponsorship activities. It focuses on the negative consequences or short term harms associated with drinking to excess. For further information on the Drinking Nightmare Campaign click here
In 2009-10 (phase two), the Campaign will include Indigenous specific advertising, collateral and public relations activities. Branded “Your life, your culture, you choose’, it will focus on the positive choices or alternatives to drinking alcohol, that are available to Indigenous youth.Back to Top
Who is the Indigenous campaign for?
The Indigenous campaign is aimed at three audiences:Primary target audience: Young Indigenous Australians aged 15 to 25 years old.
Secondary target audience: Parents, extended family and community members in urban, regional and remote Indigenous communities.
Tertiary target audience: Information sources such as Indigenous media, key opinion leaders, community leaders, cultural/social stakeholders, Aboriginal medical services, general practitioners, health workers, and peak Indigenous health groups.Back to Top
The Indigenous focus
The Indigenous component of the campaign focuses on:- Indigenous youth having the choice and assertiveness to look after themselves and their family/friends, and that they can still have fun and belong without binge drinking.
- Positive messages and images about strong culture, families and healthy choices.
This includes showcasing opportunities and alternative lifestyles to binge drinking, and promoting that support is available.
Other components of the National Binge Drinking Strategy
The campaign is an integral part of the National Binge Drinking Strategy, which also includes:- A $14.4 million grants-based program to support community partnerships with sporting and other non-governmental organisations will seek to positively influence environments that can shape the culture of binge drinking among young people;
- $5.2 million will be invested in a significant expansion of the Good Sports initiative of the Australian Drug Foundation – to support local sporting clubs to build a culture of responsible drinking at the grassroots level; and
- $19.1 million to support innovative early intervention and diversion programs to identify young people under 18 years who have been involved in an alcohol-related incident. This initiative would aim to intervene before more serious alcohol-related problems emerge.Back to Top
Background
Alcohol-related harm is a major cause of mortality and morbidity in Australia, causing around 3,200 deaths and 81,000 hospitalisations every year1. In 2004-05, the annual cost to the Australian community of alcohol-related social problems was estimated at $15.3 billion.2.After tobacco, alcohol is the second largest contributor to drug-related harm in Australia, causing harmful effects in both the short and longer term3. Short term (acute harm) relates to the risk of immediate harms from alcohol such as accidents, injuries and physical harms, often associated with drinking to intoxication, whilst longer term (chronic harm) reflects the detrimental effects on the body of the prolonged use of alcohol.
Overall the main causes of alcohol-related deaths are cancer, alcoholic liver cirrhosis and road trauma, although the proportions of these vary by life stage. Younger people are more likely to die from bouts of intoxication or road trauma, while older people are more likely to die from conditions related to long-term alcohol misuse4.
Alcohol has become more readily accessible over the past two decades, and harms resulting from drinking among young people have increased throughout the 1990s. For example, looking at all the harms experienced by young people 15-34 years of age, alcohol is responsible for more drug-related deaths and hospitalisations than all illicit drugs grouped together, and many more than tobacco.5
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1 Chikritzhs, T, et al. (2003) Australian Alcohol Indicators: Bulletin 12, Trends in estimated alcohol-attributed deaths and hospitalisations in Australia 1996-2005
2 Collins, D., Lapsley H. (2008) The cost of tobacco, alcohol and illicit drug abuse to Australian society in 2004/05. Commonwealth of Australia.
3 Chikritzhs, T., Jonas, H., Heale, P., Dietze. P., Hanlin, K. & Stockwell, T.(2001). Mortality and life years lost due to alcohol: a comparison of acute and chronic causes. Medical Journal of Australia, 174 (6), 281-284.
4 Chikritzhs, T., Jonas, H., Heale, P., Dietze. P., Hanlin, K. & Stockwell, T. (1999). Alcohol-caused deaths and hospitalisations in Australia, 1990-1997. National Alcohol Indicators, Bulletin 1, December 1999. Perth: National Drug Institute.
5 Loxley, W., Toumbourou, J.W., Stockwell, T., Haines, B., Scott, K., Godfrey, C., Waters, E., Patton, G., Fordham, R., Gray, D., Marshall, J., Ryder, D., Saggers, S., Sanci, L. & Williams, J. (2004). The prevention of substance use, risk and harm in Australia: A review of the evidence. Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy, Funded by the Australian Government Department of Health and Ageing.
