National—
On February 15th, 2024, Dr. Thongchai Keeratihattayakorn, the Secretary of the Alcoholic Beverage Control Committee, publicly spoke to the press after the Alcoholic Beverage Control Committee meeting regarding the appropriateness and possibility of lifting a ban on alcohol sales during specific hours, especially 2PM to 5PM in the afternoons.
The Alcoholic Beverage Control Committee will present the resolutions and opinions from the meeting to the next National Alcoholic Beverage Policy Committee on February 19th.
The opinions that would be discussed include two issues regarding appropriateness and possibility, according to Dr. Thongchai.
Regarding the appropriateness, there would be a statistical analysis of economic and health impacts using incident data during New Year Celebration 2024. The statistics indicated that of road accidents in Thailand, more than 25% were from DUIs. A large number of these, between 2,000 to 3,000, motorcyclists who had road accidents, falling on their own, was also presented.
As for the possibility of extending hours of alcohol sales, this was technically in accordance with the Alcoholic Beverage Control Act 2008 and Revolutionary Council Announcement No. 253. The legal hours of alcohol sales currently were limited to specific hours from 11:00 AM to 2:00 PM and 5:00 PM to 12:00 AM and the law was under the authority of the Ministry of Interior.
Dr. Thongchai further added that the Thai Ministry of Public Health held no sole authority alone to consider the proposed lifting of a ban on alcohol sales during specific hours, although the Ministry was against changing the current hours of legal sales.
Therefore, the topic of interest would be presented to the National Alcoholic Beverage Policy Committee meeting on February 19th for further consideration regarding the appropriateness and possibility.
