What is wrong with this picture? At the recent elephant festival, we found the Beer Lao booth promoting their special festival brand beer--Lane Xang (Million Elephants--name of the former Kingdom in what is present-day Laos). They were having a raffle and it looked like the grand prize was this Lane Xang Beer scooter. Alcohol plays a large role in the Lao culture and being unable to perform emergency surgery because you are drunk or driving while intoxicated is not shameful or unaccepted. During Jon and Rose's visit, Jon gave an excellent grand rounds about the physical and societal effects of alcohol including trauma, fetal alcohol syndrome and professionalism in the medical community. I have found myself in some uncomfortable and unsafe situations due to the lack of societal understanding of drunk driving. I once was riding with someone I thought had drank more than he should have and listened as he told me about his long time physician friend who had died in an alcohol-related crash that week. There seemed to be no understanding that this could happen to him (or innocent others), too.
I have noticed some signs around town placed by the Beer Lao company discussing responsible use of alcohol, but they are not wide-spread and I doubt they are effective. The government has a significant financial stake in Beer Lao which is a conflict for public health issues. The no smoking campaigns have taken off in the hospitals. We will see how long it takes for responsible use of alcohol to be aggressively promoted.
