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Scientists have called for the alcohol industry to be banned from sponsoring sport and a new system introduced where governments use the proceeds of alcohol taxation to sponsor sports via independent bodies.

Writing in Addiction, Kypros Kypri, a professor at Newcstle University in Australia, and Kerry O'Brien, a professor at the University of Manchester, claim there is an opportunity in the UK to 'ring fence' revenue from any tax-driven increase in the price of alcohol and use this to fund sports and healthy community activities.

The professors cite a study they produced last year which provided evidence of a link between alcohol industry sponsorship and hazardous drinking among sports participants. Their findings were dismissed by both the Portman Group and the European Sponsorship Association, which the professors claim 'is reminiscent of arguments used by the tobacco industry in the 1990s'. They argue that it is up to the alcohol industry to prove that sponsorship of sport does not cause unhealthy alcohol use among adults or encourage children to drink.

O'Brien said: 'Sports administrators are sending mixed messages to participants and fans when, on the one hand, they embrace and peddle alcohol via their sport, while on the other they punish individual sports stars and fans when they display loutish behaviour while intoxicated.'

He said that Anheusuer-Busch spent more than $194 million, or around 80 per cent of its American television advertising budget, on sport in the first six months of this year. 'That is a staggering amount and indicate the centrality of sport as a marketing tool for alcohol sales,' said O'Brien.

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