I mean, just look at them

I think it's the thought of cutting up such lovely old maps that I can't quite bring myself to do. I once bought some 1960s OS maps to dissect to make Birthday cards from and it made me quite sad.

Niiiiiiice. I keep threatening to do this with the collection of 1940s Bartholomews maps of Scotland I have squirrelled away.

This is obviously bad, but it isn't new. @niamhfitzgerald.bsky.social and I found exactly the same thing when we compared the approaches to alcohol policy of the four UK nations back in 2015 in a report for @nestauk.bsky.social.

www.nesta.org.uk/report/four-...

A red grouse standing on a rock, silhouetted against the Derbyshire moors

A male ring ouzel (like a blackbird, but with a smart white band across its chest) standing amongst some broken bracken

A pied flycatcher, a small black and white bird, yelling heartily from the top of a tree, trying to attract a mate

A smart wheatear, although that appears to be missing some of its tail, perched on a post, giving me some side-eye

Found a few lovely birds on the moors at lunchtime yesterday 🦉

Are Bike Lanes Actually Ruining Our Cities? YouTube video by Global Cycling Network

Inspired by this video youtu.be/etwt75kYYhk I thought I'd explore some of the statistics around car access and deprivation with some #datavis and analysis.

Usefully, the 2021 Census in the UK asked questions around car ownership as well as many aspects of 'deprivation'. So here is 📊 🧵... [1/8]

What Are the Characteristics of Households That Purchase Alcohol‐Free and Low‐Alcohol Drinks in Great Britain in 2018 and 2021? Introduction The increasing popularity of alcohol-free and low-alcohol (NoLo) drinks could reduce alcohol-related harm if those at greatest risk replace their standard alcoholic drinks with these pr...

📢 New SARG paper! Led by @zoelclarke.bsky.social this study used household purchasing data to examine who buys no/lo drinks. It found that households from higher social grades who purchase more alcohol are most likely to buy no/lo products regularly. #AlcoholPolicy #PublicHealth

Great stuff here from my colleague @damonm1989.bsky.social talking about his recent paper exploring the wider economic impacts of changes in consumer spending on unhealthy commodities.

Pretty well actually - the off-kilterness of it keeps my on my toes for spotting weird nonsense in the data. Of which there is much.

Me too! My initial thought was ‘why does this sound like it’s melting?’, but it’s definitely grown on me.

Angine de Poitrine - Full Performance (Live on KEXP) YouTube video by KEXP

This week, I have mostly attempting to clean a big, messy, dataset while listening to Angine de Poitrine, which feels like a very appropriate soundtrack to all the weirdness I keep finding in the data.

youtu.be/0Ssi-9wS1so?...

Low and no alcohol availability and sales in small retailers in Great Britain: A geographic longitudinal analysis from 2018 to 2022 Background and aims The United Kingdom Government is committed to reducing alcohol consumption through increasing the availability of alcohol-free and low-alcohol (No/Lo) drinks; however, little is ...

New research co-authored by SARG's @voodooeconomics.bsky.social and @drduncgillespie.bsky.social shows that while no/lo availability tripled during the study period, access was skewed towards more affluent and rural areas. Read the full paper in @addictionjournal.bsky.social 👇 #PublicHealth

What do you want to do? There is a lot of nice countryside - quiet beaches or watery broads. Norwich is nice. Otherwise lots of quaint villages, but the towns are mostly fine but unremarkable. Cromer has fairly nice seaside town vibes. Yarmouth has very shabby seaside town vibes.

Recruitment poster from the University of Sheffield and the Sheffield Addictions Research Group (SARG). The headline asks: "DO YOU WORK FOR AN ALCOHOL TREATMENT OR RECOVERY SERVICE?" The sub-header reads: "Share your expertise to help the Sheffield Addictions Research Group (SARG) understand the advice given to service users about alcohol-free drinks." Eligibility criteria are listed with icons: 1. Must be aged 18 or over. 2. In a client-facing role now or in the last two years. 3. Based in a non-NHS service in the UK. A "PARTICIPATE NOW" section includes three bullet points: 15-20 minutes, 100% anonymous, and "Help shape national guidance" There is a large QR code and the link https://sarg-sheffield.ac.uk/survey to take the survey. Footer text notes: "This project is funded by the National Institute for Health and Social Care Research (NIHR) Mental Health Incubator. Reference: NIHR200172. University of Sheffield ethics approval has been obtained. Reference: 072040. The sub-header reads: "Share your expertise to help the Sheffield Addictions Research Group (SARG) understand the advice given to service users about alcohol-free drinks." Eligibility criteria are listed with icons: 1. Must be aged 18 or over. 2. In a client-facing role now or in the last two years. 3. Based in a non-NHS service in the UK. A "PARTICIPATE NOW" section includes three bullet points: 15-20 minutes, 100% anonymous, and "Help shape national guidance" There is a large QR code and the link bit.ly/4cFKyFh to take the survey. Footer text notes: "This project is funded by the National Institute for Health and Social Care Research (NIHR) Mental Health Incubator. Reference: NIHR200172. University of Sheffield ethics approval has been obtained. Reference: 072040.

We're looking for people who work in alcohol treatment or recovery services to complete a survey about what advice is given to service users about alcohol-free drinks: sarg-sheffield.ac.uk/survey Please share to help us reach as many people as possible! #AlcoholRecovery #MentalHealth

The data lives here: www.ons.gov.uk/economy/infl...

You can also see the impact of the reforms to alcohol duty in August 2023 (the vertical dotted line). Sparkling wine taxes were cut, with prices falling accordingly. Taxes for most other wine rise (depending on strength), and prices also spiked, although only temporarily.

Revisiting some of my favourite pricing data that the ONS quietly publish each month - here's how the price of a bottle of wine has changed over the last 16 years after adjusting for inflation 📊

Big falls for sparkling and rose wine in particular.

Age-period-cohort effects are hard. Just ask a demographer.

tl;dr cohort studies are extremely cool, but tell you very little about period trends (at least, without external corroboration)

Drug use trends in young people may or may not be good, or bad (I've no idea), but knowing that 23 year olds are more likely to have ever tried drugs than they had when they were 17 isn't really very informative at all about that question.

As an aside, getting worried about the apparent increase in drug use is also not entirely sensible. If you ask people about whether they have ever done something, then asking older people will always get you more yeses, simply by virtue of the fact that older people have had more time to do stuff.

Or less. WE HAVE LITERALLY NO IDEA.

So while this is an interesting bit of research/data, it doesn't really show what people seem to be interpreting it as showing.

It tells us nothing whatsoever about whether things are getting better or worse overall.

In order to know whether we should be concerned or not about these findings, we need to know what the same trends look like in previous generations. It is entirely possible that rates of binge drinking rose far *more* between the ages of 17 and 23 in previous, less abstemious cohorts.

Longitudinal data like this is really cool and useful (and a massive faff to collect), but we can only interpret their findings as evidence in shifts over the lifecourse of the participants in the study.

It isn't surprising at all that people drank more when they were 23 than when they were 17.

Binge drinking rises sharply among gen Z in their early 20s Research challenges idea of ‘generation sensible’ as alcohol and drug use increase after teenage years

Was surprised to see reports today of rising binge drinking among young adults. But the comparison is current 23 year-olds with themselves when they were 17, not with any previous generation. So we've no idea if binge drinking *in 23 year-olds* is rising or not.

www.theguardian.com/society/2026...

This is interesting stuff on the timing and persistence of the life-expectancy impacts of the pandemic.

Notably for the UK, England & Wales and Scotland are in the 'first wave peak + rebound to pre-pandemic levels' group, while Northern Ireland is in the 'prolonged depression' group.

Today's episode of adventures in UI excellence. Who on Earth designed this and what is wrong with them?

This is an astounding photo.

Took a bit of work to track down as it has been reposted so much on Facebook without credit, but this is taken by David L Batcheller.

b) different alcohol policies are supported by different levels of evidence and can have very different levels and distribution of benefits. Modelling studies can help us to understand these differences, and help policy-makers to chose the policies that make the most sense for their contexts.

In the commentary I argue that:
a) modelling evidence like this is critical for understanding the potential effects that alcohol policies can have on chronic conditions like cancer where the impacts aren't immediate and can be tricky to identify in evaluation studies
...