As a follow up to some of last week's posts, the head of the NHS Statistics division has replied to the Straight Statistics critique of the alcohol-related hospital admissions. (See the comment section here.)
On behalf of the NHS Information Centre, I’d like to confirm that the figures in the press notice for alcohol related admissions in 2009/10 (1,057,000) and 2002/03 (510,800) are both calculated using the methodology introduced in 2009. They (and the remaining figures) in Table 4.1 of the report are comparable and show a large increase, subject to the various points of detail in the footnotes to that table.
Make of that what you will. The devil is in the "detail in the footnotes". The relevant table is on page 67 of this document.
And, a week after Simon Chapman memorably dismissed the idea of there being any smuggled tobacco in Australia, saying:
Smuggled tobacco is a major issue in nations with high corruption indexes and open borders. It has never been a major problem in Australia.
The Australian Daily Telegraph reports:
Sydney flooded with illegal cigarettes
SYDNEY is flooded with blackmarket cigarettes selling for as little as half the price of a genuine pack, but peddlers are avoiding punishment because it is tobacco companies who catch them.
Lies, all lies! You've got no proof!
The Daily Telegraph was able to purchase Chinese-made counterfeit cigarettes from outlets at Kings Cross and Warwick Farm.
Alright, I'll give you that. But, as Chapman says, there's never been a prosecution, therefore there is no problem.
British American Tobacco (BAT) conducts about 1000 undercover purchases each year and has taken legal action against more than 100 retailers in the past three years, effectively suing them for copyright infringements.
That doesn't count! There's never been a prosecution by the government.
In the year before Project Wickenby began, the Australian Taxation Office completed 53 tobacco prosecutions and had another 24 in progress.
Bugger.
