Scottish Health Action on Alcohol Problems (SHAAP), Alcohol Focus Scotland (AFS), the British Medical Association (BMA), and Scottish Families Affected by Alcohol and Drugs (SFAD), along with other a range of other public health and charity leaders have signed an open letter in support of minimum unit pricing, ahead of the continuation of the court case in Edinburgh this week.

The letter reaffirms the necessity for public health to prevail over the interests of big business and the effectiveness of MUP as a measure to reduce access to and harms caused by cheap high strength alcohol in Scotland.

Support MUP. Sign our declaration.

#MUPsaveslives.

Lisa Scholin, Research Assistant at the Institute for Social Marketing, University of Stirling and PhD student at Liverpool John Moores University spoke at SHAAP/SARN's 2015/16 Alcohol Occasional seminar series about alcohol in pregnancy. In her presentation, Scholin outlined the main themes around alcohol in pregnancy and the  associated risks of consuming alcohol during pregnancy. She then outlined findings from her PhD research which examined advice about alcohol given to women, parents and midwives in England and Sweden. There were significant differences between the two countries with pregnant women in England more likely to consume alcohol during pregnancy and believe this was okay. Scholin concluded that risk is culturally framed and this influences the advice given to women in both countries and how it is perceived - a summary of her presentation's key points can be found here.

SHAAP has submitted a response to Northern Ireland's Department for the Environment consultation on regulations to introduce measures to tackle drink driving. We also submitted an extended response.

In our response we supported the proposal to reduce the drink driving threshold in Northern Ireland to 50mg/100ml and outlined key evidence from Scotland.

Research and Policy Briefing No.10 now out. Highlights include:

• MESAS Final Annual Report
• New CMO drinking guidelines
• MUP update
• Evaluating the Public Health Responsibility Deal
• Scotland leading the way in alcohol policy - Four Nations report

The next Scottish Alcohol Research Network (SARN) meeting will be held on Thursday 12^th May 2016 at University of Dundee in the Dalhousie building. The draft agenda can be accessed here.

If you would like to attend this meeting, please confirm your attendance to either Andrew Symon (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.) or Vic Troy (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.) by Monday 2nd May.

Please note, parking at the University can be diffcult, so if you require a parking permit, please let Andrew Symon know as soon as possible.

Mariann Skar, Secretary General of Eurocare (The European Alcohol Policy Alliance), spoke at SHAAP's 2015/16 Alcohol Occasional seminar series about alcohol labelling in Europe. In her talk, Skar provided a brief overview of Eurocare and outlined some of the challenges facing the alcohol policy community in Europe with regards to product labelling. Across Europe, there are high levels of public support for nutritional information on product labels and the current legislative environment offers an opportunity to disseminate health information to consumers. Going forward, there remains important questions about how consumers respond to health labelling and crucially, how public health advocates counteract the effects of high levels of spending on advertising by the alcohol industry - a summary of her presentation's key points can be found here.

Dr Richard Cooke, Department of Psychology at Aston University, Birmingham, spoke at SHAAP's 2015/16 Alcohol Occasional Seminar series about his work on the CALIBRATE project - a European survey of University student alcohol use. He outlined the background to CALIBRATE and presented findings from his own research. Social motivations for drinking were most common and students displayed a clear preference for educational rather than restrictive alcohol control strategies. Cooke concluded his talk by clarifying that his results provide findings from a sample of students at a particular point in time. He would like to extend this study to other universities and to other countries - a summary of his presentation's key points can be found here.

SHAAP has submitted a response to the UK Department of Health's Consultation on the Chief Medical Officers' (CMO) new drinking guidelines. We also submitted an extended response.

In our response we support the guidelines and call for further action on price, availability and marketing.

Scottish Health Action on Alcohol Problems (SHAAP) received a letter from First Minister Nicola Sturgeon thanking us for our continued support in tackling alcohol misuse in Scotland.

The letter came in response to the publication of SHAAP's Top 20 recommendations for action on alcohol, which was sent directly to the First Minister, all MSPs and all Scottish MPs.

Scottish Health Action on Alcohol Problems (SHAAP), in collaboration with the Scottish Alcohol Research Network (SARN), are holding a one-day symposium for postgraduate students and early career researchers in Scotland who are interested in alcohol-related research. The symposium will be held at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh on 18th April.

We welcome all delegates to submit a poster, which will be displayed during the event. If you would like to present a poster at the Symposium, please contact Jennifer Fingland (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.) by 11th April.