Summary

• Zero-alcohol products are being marketed in areas that are deemed child-protected by the Public Health (Alcohol) Act (2018), exposing children to alcohol marketing which is a known driver of alcohol consumption in children and young people.
• These products normalise a culture of alcohol consumption, blur potential conflicts of interest in developing public health policies and put people in recovery at risk of relapse.
• There is little evidence for these products’ health benefits as either as a solution for alcohol use or a harm reduction strategy for heavy alcohol users

What’s needed: Zero-alcohol products that use the same branding as their full-strength alternatives must be subject to the same marketing regulations under the Public Health (Alcohol) Act.

Recommendations:

• Prohibiting the marketing of zero alcohol drinks to children and in the spaces designated by PHAA as children’s environments. This will require an amendment to the Public Health (Alcohol) Act 2018 to make explicit what was already implicit in the legislation.
• Banning brand sharing – i.e. advertising that associates zero alcohol products with the full-strength brands. This is in place in Norway.[47]
• Developing regulations around the sale of NoLos, in particular zero alcohol products which are not suitable for
  children to purchase.
• Monitoring the consumption of these products and impact on aggregated alcohol consumption to understand the public health implications of NoLos.