Under the influence

System-level effects of alcohol industry-funded health information organizations

Bibliographic Data

ID22945312
AuthorsNason Maani (0000-0002-3398-0688, University of Edinburgh), May Ci Van Schalkwyk (0000-0003-2210-2289, Department of Health Services Research and Policy, Faculty of Public Health and Policy, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine , 15-17 Tavistock Place, London WC1H 9SH , UK), Mark Petticrew (0000-0002-6378-5517, Department of Public Health, Environments and Society, Faculty of Public Health and Policy, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine , 15-17 Tavistock Place, London WC1H 9SH , UK, corresponding author)
Year2023
Volume38
Issue6
Publication date2023-12-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueHealth Promotion International (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0957-4824 • E-ISSN: 1460-2245
PublisherOxford University Press (OUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1093/heapro/daad167
PMID38097395
OpenAlexW4389762183
LanguageEN
Citations received8
References cited46

There is now an established body of evidence that the alcohol industry seeks to obstruct public health policies that could affect the availability, affordability or marketing of alcohol. In parallel, the alcohol industry is active in funding corporate social responsibility initiatives, with a particular focus on ‘responsible drinking’ campaigns, often facilitated by national-level charities established and/or funded by the alcohol industry and associated organizations. While evidence continues to grow regarding biases in the content produced by such health information organizations, they remain active in partnerships with government health departments on national health promotion campaigns and provide a range of health-related information to the public, community organizations and schools. To understand the implications of such access for policymakers, researchers and the public, there is a need to consider the wider, system-level influences of such organizations and their place in wider alcohol industry strategies. In this article, we describe evolving evidence of the direct and indirect strategic effects of such organizations and demonstrate how they serve key roles in the alcohol industry through their existence, content, partnerships and public profiles. We end by considering the implications for how we conceptualize charities established or funded (entirely or partly) by harmful commodity industries, and to what extent current conflicts of interest guidelines are sufficiently effective.

Advertising · Affect (linguistics) · Alcohol industry · Business · Commodity · Environmental health · Government (linguistics) · Health promotion · Political science · Politics · Promotion (chess) · Public health · Public relations · Global Public Health Policies and Epidemiology · Health Policy Implementation Science · Marketing · Medicine · Nursing · Psychology · Substance Abuse Treatment and Outcomes