Since January 1, 2020, a ban on the sale of alcohol on beaches (end of seasonal liquor permits), in pavilions (stricter control of night retail sales outside the establishment) and alcoholic beverages, which are stronger than 7.5% at public events, has come into force. The retail sale of alcohol in the open air was only allowed within a radius of 40 meters around the sales building and extended the rights of municipalities to impose additional restrictions (for catering establishments). A special type of seasonal licence to sell alcoholic beverages during the holiday, leisure and tourism season has been abolished [36]. Anti-Veryga groups dispute the validity of government statistics. When the health minister raised the age of alcohol consumption to 20, Rimkutė said she always went to bars and friends bought her drinks. Many underage drinkers have swapped their nights for nights and drink in apartments, while others rush to buy alcohol before shops stop selling it at 8 p.m. most nights or at 3 p.m. on Sundays. – Alcohol trafficking is prohibited on beaches and at sporting events Since 2020, local communities have the right to ban alcohol trafficking at public events. With the declaration of independence of the Republic of Lithuania, the constitution was restored before the occupation of 1938 and all foreign constitutions and laws of 11 March 1990 were declared illegitimate [11].
This effectively led to a situation where almost all government regulations on aspects of the production, import and sale of alcohol were disabled until the introduction of the Alcohol Control Act in 1995. The absence of laws, poor border controls and large personal financial gains from the sale of alcohol led to a dramatic increase in alcohol consumption in the first half of the 1990s. Alcohol consumption stabilized after the adoption of the Alcohol Control Act and the establishment of appropriate control institutions in 1995. Thus, the implementation of the alcohol control policy in Lithuania began with stricter cycles of control and liberalization. Lithuania`s alcohol control policy is based on laws that set policy objectives, define and describe policies and the framework for implementation. All strategic strategy papers are adopted by parliament or government as part of the democratic legislative process, either in the form of laws or resolutions. The Alcohol Control Act is the most important policy document, supplemented by general guidelines and other laws. Alcohol exposure has been a public health challenge in many countries around the world, and particularly in Europe, in recent decades. In 2006, the EU adopted a strategy to help Member States reduce alcohol-related harm, and the need for a policy response was reaffirmed in 2008 and 2010 in a call for consensus to develop a global strategy to reduce harmful alcohol consumption at the World Health Assembly [1]. Nevertheless, the adoption of policies set out in various international documents has proven to be a laborious and slow process at the national level [2,3]. Lithuania is a country with a ubiquitous alcohol standard. Dr.
Aina Medzevičienė, who has been alcohol-free for 10 years, says most Lithuanians are unknowingly in the first phase of an alcohol problem. She says it starts at a young age in households, as adults allow young people to drink alcohol with them. This then leads to an increasing consumption of alcohol at various events, with friends and at university. Dr. Medzevičienė was at a point where she was unable to spend a weekend without alcohol when she and her husband decided to do without alcohol. Arguing that the rules were too strict, Lithuania`s ruling conservative-liberal coalition drafted amendments to the respective laws and presented proposals to lower the legal drinking age to 18 and extend the period of alcohol sales. The new law allows NTAKD to block internet sources that publish alcohol advertising on the Lithuanian market. Since advertising is treated very broadly, any item could be a reason to block the entire website, in addition, the archives of old articles could also result in penalties. Therefore, at the moment when the website of Wine magazine is closed, the news sites of many Lithuanian online stores are closed.
NTAKD`s statement that it is not permitted to write on the labels of alcoholic beverages the names of websites with advertising content also applies, given that any website of the wine producer could be treated as advertising. According to the laws in force in Lithuania, introduced in 2018 by farmers and the Greens, the sale of alcohol in the country is allowed on Sundays between 10:00 and 15:00 and every other day between 10:00 and 20:00. Parliament reacted very quickly by adopting the agreement on 8 October. The Alcohol Control Act [76], which came into force in October 2016, changed the fact that sellers of alcoholic beverages cannot require a customer who purchases alcoholic beverages to present valid identification if there is doubt that the person is under 18 years of age. Other amendments, which came into force on 28 November 2001 [28], allowed alcohol to be sold at retail at petrol stations. The state monopoly on production was abolished with the amendment which entered into force on 28 June 2002 [29]. However, it gave municipalities more rights to restrict or prohibit the sale of alcoholic beverages and to identify environments where consumption was prohibited. The possibility of a state monopoly on alcohol was also abolished by the Constitutional Court on 26 January 2004 [30]. All alcohol control measures used in our models were variables coded by a mannequin with a value of 0 before the measurement and 1 after, testing a sudden lasting effect. More and more young Lithuanians are opting for an alcohol-free lifestyle, which proves the effectiveness of the Lithuanian model of alcohol policy.
In June 2017, Lithuania adopted improved laws on alcohol policy. Recently, however, there has been talk of weakening this political model. However, this is not what the public wants. The Lithuanian people support the current model of effective alcohol policy, which protects their young people and children from harm. The research reported in this publication was also supported by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism of the National Institutes of Health (NIAAA), grant number 1R01AA028224-01. This research was conducted as part of the project “Assessing the Impact of Alcohol Control Policies on Morbidity and Mortality in Lithuania and Other Baltic States”, and we would like to thank the entire team for their contribution to broader discussions in the preparation of the research reported in this article. The content is the responsibility of the authors and does not reflect the official positions of the NIAAA or the National Institutes of Health. The case reflects the tradition of a policy of alcohol control based on laws and therefore on the possibility of subversion, since any measure of control in society is perceived as being introduced by the highest authority of the state and therefore legal. In public, responsibility for a controversial decision has been assigned to Parliament, while it may have been a voluntary action by retailers that may have been aimed at preventing proposed new changes to the legal age limit. The changes from 2008 to 2011 focused on tightening restrictions on physical availability by limiting sales.