Alcohol Action Ireland press release, Wednesday, 16 September 2026
Alcohol Action Ireland (AAI), the national independent advocate to reduce alcohol harm, welcomes today’s announcement of the EU Kids Act by EU Commission president Ursula von der Leyen, but cautions more robust safeguards are badly needed to protect children from predatory online marketing practices when it comes to health-harming commodities such as alcohol.
AAI CEO Dr Sheila Gilheany said: “While the full text of this legislation is yet to be seen, what has been unveiled today seems to focus on limiting children’s access to social media and while this is welcome, more robust measures are urgently needed to stop children and teenagers being targeted by the marketing of harmful products such as alcohol once they are online. The reality is that policy makers, legislators and protectors of children’s rights are already way behind industry tactics designed to ensure young people drink as soon as possible and as often as possible.
“We know that digital alcohol marketing employs subtle tactics, including influencer marketing, sponsored content, and user-generated content, which effectively promotes drinking behaviours among young people. We also know that there is significant association between exposure to alcohol advertisements and drinking intentions, attitudes, and behaviours, particularly among children and adolescents, with alcohol marketing a key driver of both initiating alcohol use by children and increasing use if they have already started drinking.
“Social-media and video sharing platforms offer ideal environments for marketing, allowing alcohol companies to reach young people with tailored and engaging content, often through the exploitation of user data and preferences to create sophisticated, personalised marketing content.
“There is a lack of data collection in Ireland regarding the scale of online alcohol advertising to young people, which needs to be urgently addressed. A report developed by the Institute of Public Health for the Online Health Taskforce found a lack of systematic evidence on the scale and type of digital marketing encountered by children, while also identifying alcohol marketing as an area where evidence points to substantial levels of exposure among young people. It also highlighted the absence of comprehensive monitoring systems, and a lack of a single body responsible for assessing children’s exposure and coordinating actions.
“It is within this context that we must view the 12% increase in youth drinking in Ireland over the past decade and we now have a situation where young drinkers, 15–24-year-olds, make up the largest proportion of the population consuming alcohol (78%), significantly higher than the national average (71%) – this in a country where 64% of young people regularly binge drink and one in three young drinkers has an Alcohol Use Disorder. Meanwhile the most recent figures available show that 16% of all deaths in Europe among 15-19-year-olds were attributable to alcohol, while for 20-24-year-olds this figure was 23%.”
In Ireland, the world-leading Public Health (Alcohol) Act (PHAA) restricts certain elements of alcohol marketing to minimise children’s exposure and help reduce the normalisation of alcohol in youth culture. However, these modest measures do not extend to digital marketing.
Dr Gilheany continued: “Maximising advertising revenue is the core part of many social media companies’ business model, and we cannot trust them to voluntarily keep our children safe. Social media companies should be obligated to reveal who sees alcohol ads, right now we just don’t know. Digital marketing and advertising of alcohol content, which is being spread through social media and image/video sharing platforms by alcohol producers and their brands, is often inconsistent with producers’ own self-regulation advertising frameworks. Therefore, effective and enforced legal regulation is necessary – not self-regulation by industry-funded bodies.
“This is especially true in relation to algorithmic targeting, or recommender systems, that determine what social media users see based on personal data such as search history, past purchases, age and location, given these algorithms are not covered by Ireland’s Online Safety Code.
“While Ireland, under the EU Digital Services Act, has introduced a ban on profiling for advertisements when a platform can establish with reasonable certainty that the recipient of the service is a minor, content is not covered by this even though issues persist in relation to children being fed harmful content on social media and video sharing platforms. This is of further concern because it can be argued that there is a fine line between what constitutes advertising and what constitutes content.
“There is no doubt that government is aware of the need to protect children from harmful advertising online given that they have implemented some moderate controls in relation to gambling ads on social media and on-demand platforms under the Gambling Regulation Act 2024.
“AAI believe a multi-departmental and multi-agency response is necessary to regulate against manipulative digital and social media marketing and to curtail the harmful effects of social media advertising practices.
“It is essential that government, through strong regulation and enforcement, as well as fostering awareness and advocating for responsible media consumption practices, strives to protect young people as they navigate the online world.”
ENDS
