OpenStreetMap data for alcohol research: reliability assessment and quality indicators

There is a growing interest in using OpenStreetMap [OSM] data in health research. We evaluate the usefulness of OSM data for researching the spatial availability of alcohol, a field which has been hampered by data access difficulties. We find OSM data is about 50% complete, which appears adequate for replicating findings from other studies using alcohol licensing data. Further, we show how OSM quality metrics can be used to select areas with more complete alcohol data. The ease of access and use may create opportunities for analysts and researchers seeking to understand broad patterns of alcohol availability.