Beverage sales and drinking and driving: The role of on-premise drinking places

Objective: The relationships between on-premise drinking places, beverage s pecific alcohol sales and drinking and driving were examined in a time seri es cross-sectional study of place-of-last-drink data from Perth, Western Au stralia. Method: At arrest, 2,411 drinking drivers reported their last loca tion of consumption. Tabulated by 57 premises over 4 years, the rates at wh ich individual premises were referenced as the place-of-last-drink were tak en to reflect the relative distributions of numbers of drinking drivers com ing from different premise types (hotels, taverns and nightclubs). The data were then statistically related to measures of premise types and character istics and beverage specific alcohol sales. Results: Significant cross-sect ional relationships were obtained between measures of premise types, alcoho l sales and drinking and driving. Greatest numbers of drinking drivers came from taverns and from places selling greater amounts of beer and spirits. Significant longitudinal effects were obtained for sales of beer, proportio ns of high alcohol beer sold and sales of spirits. Conclusions: As a whole, the results suggest that, at least for Western Australia, outlets selling greater amounts of beer and spirits, and greater amounts of high alcohol be er, will produce larger numbers of drinking drivers.