Analysis of gaps in alcohol policies in Brazil using the Pan American Health Organization's Alcohol Policy Scoring.

BACKGROUND: National alcohol policies need to be systematized and evaluated to identify the gaps that should be filled by future laws. This study aims to search for and classify Brazilian public alcohol policies at the federal and state levels, based on the ten Alcohol Policy Scoring (APS) domains used by the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), to identify any gaps METHODS: Documental research was carried out in two phases: document identification and content analysis. The search included laws, decrees, and ordinances for alcohol referred to in this text as regulatory documents (RD), enacted until December 31, 2019, in Brazil and its 26 states and the Federal District. The APS was used to classify and score the RD, which consists of ten policy domains (including pricing, availability, marketing, and health services), weighted according to the level of scientific evidence of each strategy RESULTS: We identified and categorized 435 valid RD (21 national laws and 414 state laws). Overall, Brazilian alcohol policies account for 51.6% (255/494) of the APS score. In the pricing policy domain, the second most robust indicator of the APS, the policy gap reached 87% in 25 states, demonstrating a weakness. Only the federal laws against drink-driving include all the recommended dimensions. There are important legislative contradictions in the definition of an alcoholic beverage and in the content of the policies to control marketing CONCLUSION: At the national level, the federal government adopted alcohol policies in several of the PAHO policy domains but enacted RD with little practical effect. At the subnational level, despite the autonomy to complement federal laws, the states have not yet addressed the most important gaps.