The federal government's drug commissioner, Burkhard Blienert, advocates new regulations for the sale of beer or wine to young people.
"For me, there are many medical arguments in favor of raising the working age for beer, wine and sparkling wine to 18," said the SPD politician to the "Welt".
“We will see what is politically possible.
In any case, what is not really possible is so-called accompanied drinking.” According to the Youth Protection Act, young people from the age of 14 are allowed to drink beer, wine or sparkling wine in the presence of a person who has custody.
Selling and drinking in public is currently allowed from the age of 16.
"Too low threshold"
“We have to gradually move from a free rampant growth to a regulated, controlled use of tobacco and alcohol.
The availability is too low-threshold,” says Blienert.
He also called it “paradoxical that you can buy tobacco of all things around the clock from vending machines almost everywhere.
We also need a well-founded debate on this.”
The drug commissioner said alcohol and tobacco should not be advertised.
It is “necessary to clearly limit the advertising opportunities for alcohol and tobacco.
I also think advertising for gambling is inappropriate.” Here, however, “the responsibility does not lie with the federal government, but with the states”.
In addition to the controlled sale of cannabis, Blienert called for a "realignment of drug policy".
The focus should be “health, not criminal law”.