Modupe Ajayi said she will never forget her recent experience on her way to Ibadan. She had boarded a 14 seater Hiace bus to Challenge garage Ibadan from Ojota Park in Lagos.
Fortunately or unfortunately she was seated in the front seat. According to her, as the driver who was probably in his thirties made to drive out from the park, he reached into the pigeon hole of the vehicle and pulled out a roll of sachet alcohol. Cutting one out from the roll, he emptied it into his mouth and drove out into the highway.
Looking at him with consternation I asked him how he can be drinking and driving and he responded that “without that striker bitters I will not see the road clearly”. Thinking that was all, I gingerly tried to relax on my seat. However during that one hour drive to Ibadan, he had reached into his pigeon hole three times and drained alcohol from three sachets.
“Of course you can imagine his reckless driving. He was speeding, overtaking other vehicles recklessly and turned the volume of the music so high. By the time we got to Iwo road Ibadan, I thanked God that we got safely to Ibadan”, narrated Mrs. Ajayi.
At the motor garage I now took a more thorough look. Virtually everybody, women, men, children were hawking many brands of alcohol in sachet and pet bottles. Boys, men were loitering, with different brands of these drinks in their hands which they sip from intermittently. Some were lounging on chairs with the drinks in their hand. The ground was littered with empty sachets and plastic bottles of this product under different names.
It is not just to challenge Motor Park Ibadan, the same story applies to all the motor parks in Nigeria and wherever you can find large gatherings of agboros or miscreants. However the consumption of this drink is not only limited to the low class but to even students, enlightened adults, people who cannot afford to purchase the regular bottle of alcohol.
Mrs. Chinelo Ije recently sent a message to her brother-in-law, beckoning him to come over to her residence. Her complaints were that her 70 years old husband who was already suffering from diabetes and had issues with prostate could not stay off alcohol in sachets and pet bottles.
According to her retired Engineer Ije, once he manages to get N100, sneaks out of the house to buy this drink. By the end of the day, sometimes he would have taken up to five different sachets of alcohol. “At that stage, he trips over the slightest obstacle on the road. I sent for my brother-in-law because on two occasions recently, my husband lost his balance while coming back home.”
Before the introduction of sachet and pet plastic alcohol, alcoholic drinks had always been in the market and people were patronising them. However the small sachets/pet bottles have made it very affordable and accessible to everyone. With just a mere N50.00, you can purchase one.
According to Mr. Emitenna, anytime he wants to drink and does not have money for beer or a bottle of hot drink, he just buys the affordable sachet alcohol and those in pet bottles. That is an unfortunate situation. Secondary school children, anyone can afford to buy it and it is sold without restriction.
A bottle of beer sells for between N600-N800 while the sachet alcohol sells from N50-N200. Children cannot conceal beer in their pockets but can easily conceal sachets and pet bottle alcohol.
NAFDAC did not ban alcohol production in bigger bottles. The Agency only banned alcohol in containers or packing that a child can easily conceal, that is sachet or PET bottles less than 200ml.
The alcoholic content in sachet or PET bottles less than 200ml is 30%. Beer has 4-8% alcohol. You can then imagine what happens when drivers, students consume as much as three in a day.
There has been so much argument for and against NAFDAC‘s ban but what should be our major concern is how to protect our young people from alcohol abuse.
How bad is youth alcohol consumption in Nigeria?
Alcohol consumption is growing among young Nigerians. Although alcohol consumption is not new to Nigerian society, historically only adults consumed it because drinking signified that one was an elder. Unwritten rules constrained youths from drinking palm wine, which was the only available alcoholic beverage then. It was believed they were too immature to handle the intoxicating effects of alcohol. Nowadays, a rising number of Nigerian adolescents and young adults consume alcohol. Some even see drinking as fashionable and those who abstain as old fashioned.
Studies have shown that young Nigerians are consuming more alcohol. For example, studies published in 2015, 2021 and 2023 found a 30%, 34% and 55.8% drinking prevalence among youths in Nigeria.
These statistics suggest that there will be more alcohol-related problems such as brain underdevelopment or damage, alcohol-induced illnesses, truancy, violence, injuries and death among young people than there used to be.
Existing studies not only show that youths are drinking, but reveal heavy drinking and drunkenness. These findings also echo a World Health Organization report from 2018 which showed that the 22.5% prevalence of heavy episodic drinking among Nigerians aged 15 to 19 years was among the highest on the African continent.
How do liquor sachets contribute to the problem?
Research has shown that several factors are responsible for youth alcohol consumption in Nigeria. Chief among them is unregulated alcohol marketing. Alcohol corporations in Nigeria increasingly use aggressive marketing strategies, advertising and sales promotions such as buy-two-get-one-free that make different brands of such alcohol readily available, accessible and affordable.
Alcoholic beverages packaged in less than 200ml plastic bottles and sachets are affordable and widely available in retail shops, supermarkets, roadside kiosks and eateries in Nigeria.
They are also sold close to primary and secondary schools, where children spend time away from thei
Sachet alcoholic beverages are also easy to carry and can be concealed from adults because of their small size. Young people can easily buy and drink them.
Another reason why sachet drinks are a problem is that they are spirit-based beverages with high potency. They can contain between 40% and 60% alcohol, which is potentially more harmful.
There’s another reason too, related to another growing problem in Nigeria. Many youths now use different types of herbal sachet and plastic bottle alcoholic beverages as aphrodisiacs and sex enhancers. A 2020 study found that 33.6% of adolescents used sachet alcohol before their last sexual intercourse.
How effective are bans of liquor products?
Well-coordinated enforcement of the ban can check the availability of sachet alcoholic beverages. This should reduce accessibility, consumption and related harms among young people.
It requires coordinated effort. As a regulatory body, the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control may not implement the ban without the support of federal law enforcement agencies like the police.
The awareness campaign should highlight the short- and long-term positive effects of the ban. This is important so that alcohol producers and marketers will not form alliances that will frustrate the purpose
.(The Nation)
