ABSTRACT
According to Ledermann (1956), alcohol-related pathologies and mortality in a population are straightforwardly associated with the level of alcohol consumption. The model implies a fixed relationship between the average consumption and the prevalence of heavy drinking and alcohol problems in a society. During the 1970s, this theory was adopted as the theoretical framework for defining efficient alcohol policies based on a public health approach, which is mostly concerned with at-risk individuals or collective lifestyles. With the publication of the so-called ‘purple book’, observing what was happening in Scandinavian societies with the increase of alcohol consumption and alcohol-related problems after a reduction of prohibitionist policies, Bruun et al. (1975) suggested the need to reduce access to alcoholic beverages in order to reduce aggregate levels of consumption as a matter of public health. Since then, the total consumption model has been accepted at the global level and became the main pillar of the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) alcohol approach (Room, 2005), as testified by many reports written under the WHO’s aegis that call for effective measures acting on the availability of alcoholic beverages: for example, by increasing alcohol taxation and prices, limiting on-premises opening hours and the number of on-and off-premises outlets, and increasing the minimum age for purchasing alcohol beverages (Anderson, Møller, & Galea, 2012).
