1.0 Introduction
Alcohol use is a key public health issue. Next to tobacco, alcohol causes the most health, social, economic and criminal harm to individuals, families, and communities.1 In addition to the harm caused by impaired driving and other alcohol-related trauma and violence, alcohol has been linked with over 60 diseases or conditions. In Ontario, alcohol attributable costs total 5.3 billion dollars.2 At the local level, municipalities are burdened with increased enforcement costs, as well as costs from other municipally funded services, that are called on to assist with some alcohol related issues, including fire, ambulance, and public works.
Though the effects of alcohol are numerous and wide-spread across a community's demographic and geographic distribution, the average person is not aware of the extent of alcohol's impact. This lack of awareness is detrimental to efforts made by groups and organizations trying to make effective change to decrease the harmful effects of alcohol use. In order to effectively target the general population it would be helpful to know the current level of awareness and attitudes towards alcohol use.
The published and grey literature shows that some communities are taking steps to measure awareness of alcohol-related harms. Along with measuring awareness, these communities seek to measure the level of support for alcohol-related health promotion policies. In Glasgow, Scotland, researchers consulted with over 4500 people to examine whether residents felt alcohol affected their community.3 They were asked which physical areas were most affected, which groups of people were most affected, and about perceived positive and negative effects of alcohol use. The North West Big Drink Debate in Liverpool, England investigated the relationship between respondents' drinking patterns (i.e. sensible, hazardous, harmful) and their views on access and availability of alcohol in their community.4 Within Canada, the Nova Scotia government conducted the Culture of Alcohol Use survey in 2008.5 This survey gathered an extensive amount of information including individual alcohol consumption and patterns; opinions on the cost, advertising and selling of alcohol; awareness of alcohol-related problems; and opinion of public policy change. Due to the unique nature of these communities each survey contained different questions and used different survey methodology. In developing the Kingston community survey we learned and borrowed from these experiences, as well as the provincial CAMH Monitor survey tool6, in order to create a custom survey to fulfill local needs.
The survey was designed to assess respondents' perceptions of the extent of alcohol-related problems in Kingston, to assess their experience with some of the second hand effects of alcohol use, and to gauge support for alcohol policies and community strategies. The results of this survey were used to contribute to a broader report of alcohol-related behaviour and health effects titled: "It Starts Here: A Conver sation about Alcohol in the City of Kingston" .7
Survey Purpose and Objectives
The purpose of this community opinion survey on alcohol use was to gather information that would be useful to Public Health program staff for programming and to engage local residents and decision makers in examining the impact alcohol is having on individuals and the community at large.
The objectives of the survey were to:
- Assess the perceptions of Kingston residents on the effects of alcohol use in the community.
- Assess the extent of public support for various policy options to control alcohol use in Kingston.