Article
Details
Citation
Burton R, Sharpe C, Bhuptani S, Jecks M, Henn C, Pearce-Smith N, Knight S, Regan M & Sheron N (2023) The relationship between the price and demand of alcohol, tobacco, unhealthy food, sugar-sweetened beverages, and gambling: an umbrella review of systematic reviews. BMC Public Health, 24 (1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-024-18599-3
Abstract
Background The WHO highlight alcohol, tobacco, unhealthy food, and sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) taxes as one
of the most efective policies for preventing and reducing the burden of non-communicable diseases. This umbrella
review aimed to identify and summarise evidence from systematic reviews that report the relationship between price
and demand or price and disease/death for alcohol, tobacco, unhealthy food, and SSBs. Given the recent recognition
as gambling as a public health problem, we also included gambling.
Methods The protocol for this umbrella review was pre-registered (PROSPERO CRD42023447429). Seven electronic
databases were searched between 2000–2023. Eligible systematic reviews were those published in any country,
including adults or children, and which quantitatively examined the relationship between alcohol, tobacco, gambling,
unhealthy food, or SSB price/tax and demand (sales/consumption) or disease/death. Two researchers undertook
screening, eligibility, data extraction, and risk of bias assessment using the ROBIS tool.
Results We identifed 50 reviews from 5,185 records, of which 31 reported on unhealthy food or SSBs, nine reported
on tobacco, nine on alcohol, and one on multiple outcomes (alcohol, tobacco, unhealthy food, and SSBs). We did
not identify any reviews on gambling. Higher prices were consistently associated with lower demand, notwithstand?
ing variation in the size of efect across commodities or populations. Reductions in demand were large enough to be
considered meaningful for policy.
Conclusions Increases in the price of alcohol, tobacco, unhealthy food, and SSBs are consistently associated
with decreases in demand. Moreover, increasing taxes can be expected to increase tax revenue. There may be poten?
tial in joining up approaches to taxation across the harm-causing commodities.
Keywords
Tax; Price; Price elasticity of demand; Alcohol; Tobacco; Unhealthy food; Sugar sweetened beverages
Journal
BMC Public Health: Volume 24, Issue 1
Status | Published |
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Funders | |
Publication date | 08/12/2023 |
Publication date online | 10/05/2024 |
Date accepted by journal | 15/04/2024 |
URL | |
Publisher | Springer Science and Business Media LLC |
eISSN | 1471-2458 |
People (1)
Senior Research Fellow, Institute for Social Marketing