Kathmandu, February 22

The National Alcohol Regulation and Control Policy recently endorsed by the Council of Ministers aims to ensure citizens’ right to lead quality life by bringing about improvement in their economic, social and health condition through reduction in the harmful use of alcohol.

The Ministry of Health said Nepal as a signatory to the global strategy unanimously ratified by 193 member countries of the World Health Organisation against harmful use of alcohol was under an international obligation to formulate and implement this policy.

The strategy to reduce harmful use of alcohol defines ‘harmful use’ as drinking that causes detrimental health and social consequences for the drinker, the people around the drinker and society at large, as well as patterns of drinking that are associated with increased risk of adverse health outcomes.

The policy has also cited the WHO figure that shows harmful use of alcohol ranks among the top five risk factors for disease, disability and death throughout the world and youths make up four per cent of total death attributed to alcohol.

Drinking alcohol is associated with a risk of developing such health problems as alcohol dependence, liver cirrhosis, cancers and injuries. The latest causal relationships suggested by research findings are those between alcohol consumption and incidence of infectious diseases such as TB, HIV/AIDS and suicides.

The policy aspires to adopt zero-tolerance against the use of alcohol in public functions, weddings and other social and cultural events. Similarly, it prohibits the retail sale and purchase of alcohol from 5:00am to 7:00pm besides limiting the volume of liquor sale at one litre per person a day.

According to the MoH, a separate mechanism will be formed from local to the central level to monitor implementation of the provisions stipulated in the policy and recommend legal action against the guilty.

“Any person below the age of 21 and pregnant women will be restricted from purchasing and consuming alcohol while retailers will not be allowed to sell alcohol-related products to the ineligible customers,” reads the policy. The ministry said the policy has also made a mandatory provision of pictorial warning label covering 75 per cent on the space of alcoholic beverage packages to deter people from drinking alcohol. The image will sport liver cirrhosis.

The new law has stated that income generation programmes and alternative employment will be created to discourage production, sale and consumption of bootleg liquor beside formulating National Alcohol and Control Bill. It also restricts promotion, publicity and advertisement of alcohol-related products through media of any kind.

“If any person dies due to consumption of tainted and contaminated liquor brewed by a company and the lab report is positive, it will be caused to pay compensation to the kin of the deceased,” said the policy.