Journal Article

The relationship between the price and demand of alcohol, tobacco, unhealthy food, sugar-sweetened beverages, and gambling: an umbrella review of systematic reviews

Bhuptani, Saloni, Pearce-Smith, Nicola, Knight, Sandy, Jecks, Mike, Sheron, Nick, Henn, Clive, Burton, Robyn, Regan, Marguerite, Sharpe, Casey

2024

Overview

Background The WHO highlight alcohol, tobacco, unhealthy food, and sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) taxes as one of the most effective 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 identified 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, notwithstanding variation in the size of effect 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 potential in joining up approaches to taxation across the harm-causing commodities.

• Publisher: BioMed Central,BioMed Central Ltd,Springer Nature B.V,BMC
• Subject: Adults / Alcohol / Alcohol Drinking - epidemiology / Alcohol use / Alcoholic beverages / Alcoholic Beverages - economics / Alcohols / Beverages / Biostatistics / Commerce - statistics & numerical data / Commodities / Death & dying / Demand / Design / Disease / Drinks / Elasticity of demand / Environmental Health / Epidemiology / Extraction / Food / Food - economics / Food consumption / Gambling / Gambling - economics / Health aspects / Health disparities / Health problems / Healthy food / Humans / Industrialized nations / Infectious diseases / Marketing / Medical screening / Medicine / Medicine & Public Health / Price / Price elasticity / Price elasticity of demand / Prices / Prices and rates / Processed foods / Public Health / Risk assessment / Sales / Sales taxes / Smoking / Sugar / Sugar-Sweetened Beverages - economics / Sugar-Sweetened Beverages - statistics & numerical data / Supply and demand / Systematic Review / Systematic Reviews as Topic / Tax / Tax regulations / Tax revenues / Taxation / Taxes / Tobacco / Tobacco products / Tobacco Products - economics / Unhealthy food / Vaccine