A pleasant night out can be shattered

In a bid to find a new approach to dealing with drink-associated injuries, a week-long conference is being held at the Cardiff International Arena.

The event - Innovations in Wound Care 2001, will be addressed by a wide variety of professionals who come into contact with injured victims.

Among them will be Professor Jonathan Shepherd of the University of Wales College of Medicine, who has fought hard for a more practical approach to minimising street and pub injuries.

Prof Shepherd is an expert on facial injuries and chairman of the Cardiff Violence Prevention Group, a pioneering multi-agency task force.

Causes of violence

He will address the causes of street and pub violence and discuss possible solutions.

Prof Shepherd - who specialises in oral and maxillofacial surgery - has been campaigning for many years to tackle drunken violence in city centres by calling for toughened glass or plastic to be used for drinking glasses in pubs and clubs.

During the conference he will also emphasise his view that addressing the causes of violence like unemployment, social deprivation and heavy drinking is the best way of tackling the issue.

He will be calling for targeted policing, family support and the limiting of weapon availability.

Women are drinking more than they used to

As a surgeon, Prof Shepherd frequently ends up nursing the wounds inflicted during post-pub fighting.

He has documented a "steady and inexorable increase in assaults requiring hospital treatment" between the mid-1970s and the mid-1990s.

"The degree of violence went up as well," he said.

"There was an automatic tendency to put the boot in, to use glasses and, more recently, bottles."

Drinking in bars

The link between alcohol and violence is well established and a report issued by the Home Office in November - Alcohol and Crime: Taking Stock - backed the notion that drinking in bars was associated with greater violence than in other settings.

A joint survey in 1999 by Police Review and Alcohol Concern, found alcohol caused more problems for police than drugs.

The report revealed 68% of police officers said they encountered alcohol-related crime and disorder on a daily basis.

The 1996 British Crime Survey found more than 13,000 violent incidents took place each week in and around pubs.

'Drinking fast'

Eric Appleby, chief executive of Alcohol Concern, says some of the blame must rest with the trend for more pub promotions.

"It's the happy hour syndrome. The whole purpose of that is to get people into a pub, get them drinking and drinking fast," said Mr Appleby.

"You go in thinking you'll have a quick one but end up having two or three and at that point the drink takes over and you end up having five or six."

Research shows that alcohol consumption is increasing. Almost 40% of men aged 16 to 24 regularly drink more than eight units (four pints) in one sitting.