Is changing the minimum legal drinking age an effective policy tool?

Area of Science:

• Public Health
• Health Policy
• Substance Abuse Research

Background:

• In 1991, Spain raised the minimum legal drinking age (MLDA) from 16 to 18 years.
• This policy change provides a unique opportunity to study the impact of MLDA on alcohol consumption and related harms.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the effect of the MLDA increase on alcohol consumption and morbidity outcomes.
• To investigate potential gender-based differences in the policy's impact.

Main Methods:

• Construction of a regional panel dataset using alcohol consumption and hospital admission data.
• Comparison of prevalence measures between a treatment group (16-18 years) and a control group (20-22 years).

Main Results:

• Overall drinking prevalence decreased by 21.37% after the MLDA increase.
• A significant reduction of 44.43% in mixed drinks and/or liquors consumption was observed specifically in males.
• No significant causal effects were found on smoking prevalence, alcohol overdose hospitalizations, or traffic accident hospitalizations.

Conclusions:

• The MLDA increase effectively reduced overall alcohol consumption, with a pronounced effect on male consumption of certain beverages.
• Findings highlight the importance of considering gender-specific impacts when formulating alcohol control policies.
• This study offers valuable insights for countries contemplating MLDA policy changes.