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According to the most recent Central Drug Authority (CDA) report, South Africa has the highest rate of foetal alcohol syndrome in the world and highest rate of alcohol dependence among its adult population in the world. But the government's promised action on this has been almost non-existent. The DA will be asking parliamentary questions to the new minister of health about what he is going to do to comply with the promises of his predecessors.

In February 2006 the Department of Health stated that it was going to get tough on alcohol abuse "before the end of the year". More than three years later, it has completely failed to take any concrete action to deal with the staggering extent of alcohol abuse in South Africa.

The promised regulations in terms of the Alcohol Act have never appeared. Although there are draft regulations in terms of the National Road Traffic Act to ban roadside advertising, these have yet to be approved. Finally, and most importantly, there is no obvious campaign in place to reduce drunken driving and alcohol abuse in general.

The CDA report reported that:

- In 2000, 7% of deaths and disabilities in South Africa were due to alcohol.
- 46% of the non-natural mortality and morbidity was linked to alcohol use including transport-related deaths.
- 6% of the population between the ages of 15-64+ (1.97 million people) can be regarded as problem drinkers.
- South Africa is ranked 47th out of 189 countries with a per capita consumption of 8.7 litres per annum. However when this figure is adjusted for the number of current drinkers between the ages of 15-64+ (10.1 million people) this figure rises to 20.1 litres of pure alcohol per capita per annum.

The CDA estimates that the economic cost to society may be as high as R17.4bn per annum. It is time that the government began to take this issue seriously.