Born in 1946 and brought up in Cupar, Fife, I was educated at the local school - 
The first tranche of analysis shows, just over a year since Scotland became the first country in the world to introduce minimum unit pricing, there has been a 3% fall in alcohol sales per adult from the previous year.
The volume of alcohol sold per adult in Scotland, compared to England and Wales, represented the smallest gap since 2002.
It comes after the Scottish Government brought into force legislation in May last year which set a minimum 50 pence per unit price to tackle the harm caused by cheap, high strength alcohol.
The results of the NHS Health Scotland Monitoring and Evaluating Scotland’s Alcohol Strategy (MESAS) programme found that the volume of alcohol sold per adult in Scotland was 9% higher than in England and Wales, where 9.1 litres was sold per adult.
Commenting, Stewart Stevenson MSP said:
“I welcome this promising start following the Scottish Government’s world-leading action to introduce minimum unit pricing.
“This initial fall of 3% shows we are moving in the right direction. Statistics show there are 22 alcohol-specific deaths every week in Scotland.
“There are also more than 680 hospital admissions which impact the person, family, partner and community affected by alcohol harm.
“Minimum unit pricing is an effective way of tackling cheap, high strength alcohol which causes real harm to many.”
“This initial fall of 3% shows we are moving in the right direction. Statistics show there are 22 alcohol-specific deaths every week in Scotland.
“There are also more than 680 hospital admissions which impact the person, family, partner and community affected by alcohol harm.
“Minimum unit pricing is an effective way of tackling cheap, high strength alcohol which causes real harm to many.”
