Very recently Health and Welfare Committee came up with the idea that celebrities age under 24 are not allowed to show themselves in the alcohol commercials. As a consequence, famous musician IU(23) and gymnast Son Yeon-jae(22) will soon be facing their TV commercial withdrawal. Along with this Health and Welfare Committee’s revised bill, there are considerable controversies.

▲ IU, current model of one of soju brands.

The foremost hot potato of the controversy is the motivation to set the disapproval of age standard under 24. The other issue is that as the committee brought this idea as a part of Korea government’s policy to improve national health and solution to reduce the rate of alcohol consumption of teenager. The effectiveness and validity of this bill is being questioned.

The Dankook Herald (DKH) surveyed people concerning a new policy and alcohol advertisement. As a result, 70% of the people didn’t care who is model of advertisement because the models does not usually affect their choice of alcohol. The people who affected by models were only 30% and only 10% of people answered that they will change a brand of alcohol according to the model. It means commercial models affect people little which could mean that limiting age of model can be inappropriate way to prevent young people’s drinking.

In reality, many people are raising a question whether this policy is reasonable. Why under 24 years people can’t be a model of alcohol commercial although they are adults? Why government limit only age of models? Kim Su-min (Sophomore, Dept. of Chemical Engineering) said “I can’t understand why the government made the policy. Adolescent alcohol use is serious fact but determining that the reason of alcohol use is advertisement is wrong. I think government should do multilateral examine to find the better solution to the problem.”

72% of people replied they were not affected by advertisement and 10% of people replied they want to drink when they see TV advertisement. Only 15% of people answered the policy will decrease drinking of teenagers and most of people answered the policy cannot affect drinking of teenagers. Lee Hee-ju (Sophomore, Dept. of Public Administration) said “I think limiting age of models will not make the decline of teenagers’ drinking because teenagers are able to distinguish between what to do and what not to do. Moreover, entertainers who were selected as alcohol models were always popular and familiar in public. Therefore, new policy is useless because subsidiaries will not select entertainer who make damage to themselves.”

Korea government is considering national health seriously as a step toward the better welfare state. Nevertheless, its policies are showing a few problems. In the end of the 2014 for example, government announced some policies on smoking to make reduce smoking rate or make smoker quit. First was price increase in cigarette and second was printing disgusting pictures on the cigarette case. However in 2015, only policy that came into effect was increasing price. Even though, printing disgusting picture is showing much effectiveness to reduce smokers around the country.

Policy on reducing smokers is not the only one that brought the doubt but also recently announced policy on alcohol. DKH interviewed Prof. Lee Ho-seong (Graduate School, Dept. of Kinesiology Medical Science) who is lecturing ‘Healing, health and coaching’ to find different idea on reducing total consumption of alcohol and dealing young people’s wrong alcoholic culture.

DKH first asked about drinking abuse. He said “Alcohol causes problems in health such as fatty liver and gastritis. Alcoholism and wrong way of relieving stress can be mental problems made by alcohol.” DKH also asked the effectiveness of regulating alcohol model’s age. He agreed with the idea that regulating the celebrities to show up in alcohol advertisement. He added that “Most of the young people are easily influenced by their favorite or well known celebrities, since they idolize and want to mimic them. Most of famous celebrities are similar age with the young and the young are easy to be influenced by their aged.” However, he doubted its effect when it comes to long-terms. “It may show reduction of alcohol consumption as a short-term, but it won’t last long enough to improve drinking culture and reduce total consumption of alcohol,” he said. DKH asked the idea to solve those problems that will last longer. “Education will be the best solution for solving those issues. In college, some of the elder students or professors pressure the young students the wrong drinking culture, so called ‘one shot’, ‘the more you drink, the more you’re strong’ and etc. Those kinds of culture should be corrected by school and education, and then it will be the long last solution for it,” he said.

The U.S. government not only limits age of alcohol commercial models but prohibits putting in drinking scene to make a TV commercial. In other words, the Korea government is just limiting age of models. Does this policy really prevent drinking of teenagers? Moreover, increasing price of cigarette resulted in decreasing sales in only 12% point. Unreasonable policy will make not help but confusion and waste. People should examine the causes of problem and think of a variety of ways to solve the problem. It is time to design effective policy to improve people’s health.

The Dankook Herald (DKH)The Dankook Herald (DKH