Projects & Research Partnerships

Introduction

SPECTRUM is generating new evidence to inform the prevention of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) caused by unhealthy commodities, including tobacco, alcohol and unhealthy food and drink.

Through eight work packages SPECTRUM research aims to transform policy and practice to encourage and enable healthy environments and behaviours. The Sheffield Tobacco and Alcohol Policy Modelling Platform (STAPM) is being used to develop new economic and health impact evidence, modelling and analysis in Work Package 4.

Work Package 4

This work package aims to develop economic and health impact evidence, modelling and analysis, focussing on wider complex system effects of unhealthy commodities and prevention policies in the UK. Its objectives include:

• Developing new evidence on the impacts of alcohol and tobacco, their associated diseases, and prevention policies on the wider economy, including: consumers' work productivity, employment and early retirement; revenue to retailers; gains and losses in different sectors of the UK economy; direct and indirect tax revenues to government; and public sector costs from healthcare, social care and crime.
• Developing and extending the Sheffield Tobacco and Alcohol Policy Model for England to analyse the economic and health impacts of changes in use of alcohol and/or tobacco on a wide range of outcomes; and producing new versions for both Wales and Scotland, thus enabling comparisons between countries.
• Undertaking translational work with collaborators in food systems to explore how economic methods in alcohol and tobacco could be of use in complex food systems modelling.

Find out more about Work Package 4 on the STAPM website.

SARG team

Members of the Sheffield Alcohol Research Group involved in SPECTRUM include Alan Brennan, Colin Angus, Duncan Gillespie, Damon Morris, Grace Leeming and Ryan Kai Le Chen.