Finland had the highest alcohol prices in the EU last year – 110% above the average. That's no accident. The high prices are the result of deliberate government policy, with steep taxes aimed at reducing consumption and improving public health. And the strategy appears to have helped: alcohol use has dropped, along with related harms like liver disease and traffic accidents.

But now, as many Finns cross borders to buy cheaper booze in Estonia and Sweden, the government is left with the same key question: do higher prices truly prevent harm, or just shift it elsewhere?

It's a question that redraws the map of Europe in bottles. Estonians drive to Latvia, Norwegians to Sweden, and Danes to Germany. In an open EU market, the steady cross-border flow of cheap alcohol complicates national public health efforts.

For instance, beer in Denmark can cost more than double compared to Germany, while Norway's alcohol tax makes it twice as expensive as the EU average. Meanwhile, in 2017, Estonians bought a third of all alcohol sold in Latvia, sparking a kind of ‘excise tax war' between the two countries.