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Daily news - 30th August 2022

UK news

Vaping reaches record levels in Great Britain, report reveals

Estimated 4.3 million people using e-cigarettes, up from about 800,000 a decade ago in ‘vaping revolution’ | Guardian, UK [see also ASH Briefing (PDF)]

Doctors warn of rise in nerve damage linked to nitrous oxide

Medics have described increase in neurological injuries resulting from laughing gas as an epidemic | Guardian, UK

Public call for tougher restrictions on buying tobacco in Britain

People in Britain strongly support restricting the sale of tobacco near schools and raising the legal age of sale to 21, finds a new UCL-led study | UCL, UK

Free medicinal cannabis to be given to epileptic children on NHS waitlist as private firms back mother’s plea

Charlotte Caldwell, whose epileptic son Billy helped change the law on medical cannabis, has secured free-to-access care for severely epileptic children which could save families private prescription costs of up to £6,000 | i news, UK

How to protect yourself from super-strength ecstasy

With reports of dangerously high strength ecstasy being sold at clubs and festivals, Mixmag has compiled a guide to help you stay safe when taking MDMA | MixMag, UK

[Open access] The UK Government's recent 10-year Drug Strategy, From Harm to Hope (the Strategy), presents an ambition to “achieve a generational shift in the country's relationship with drugs and to reduce overall drug use towards a historic 30-year low” through “bold steps to change attitudes in society around the perceived acceptability of illegal drug use” . In this commentary, I focus on the potential impacts of drug prevention activity outlined in the Strategy and consider the feasibility of achieving this headline outcome considering constraints on UK prevention systems | IJDP, UK

Drug harm reduction unit to tour West Dunbartonshire

In 2021, 28 people lost their lives in West Dunbartonshire due to overdose or other conditions related to drug abuse, one fewer than the previous year. West Dunbartonshire Health and Social Care Partnership (HSCP) is working to reduce this number further by proactively engaging with drug users, and offering basic medical care and practical safety advice | Dumbarton and Vale of Leven Reporter, UK

Leeds Festival: Boy, 16, dies after falling ill in suspected drugs incident

An investigation has been launched after the suspected drug-related death of a 16-year-old boy at Leeds Festival. The teenager fell ill at the music event on Saturday and was taken to hospital, but he died on Sunday | BBC, UK

Jersey Public Health issues advice on drug use

Public Health advised islanders not to take drugs, but said it wanted to ensure people were "fully informed, look out for others, and seek help" | BBC, UK

It can suffocate you and it can grab you’ – Clare Shine on depression and alcohol addiction" - video

In the latest episode of the Power of Sport, footballer Clare Shine opens up about her addiction to alcohol and the battle with depression that caused it. Glasgow City forward Shine, who is in a better place now, also spoke about her desire to help people by talking so openly and frankly about the struggles she has suffered with in the past few years | Eurosport, UK

When I cut my alcoholic mum out of my life, I had no other family left

As most university students excitedly booked tickets to go home for Christmas at the end of winter term in 2019, I was buying gifts for my friend’s family | Metro, UK

BuddyUp Volunteer Training

Fri, 16 September 2022, 09:30 – 16:00 BST. Online. Do you want to be a life saver? With our training you can remotely support someone injecting drugs alone, and send help if they need it | Cranstoun, UK

Gang which dealt cocaine in Shirebrook jailed

Six members of a gang who dealt hundreds of thousands of pounds of class A drugs have been jailed. The gang's leader, Thomas Carlisle, organised the distribution of cocaine in Shirebrook between May 2018 and July 2020 | BBC, UK

International news

The socioeconomic gradient of alcohol use: an analysis of nationally representative survey data from 55 low-income and middle-income countries

Alcohol is a leading risk factor for over 200 conditions and an important contributor to socioeconomic health inequalities. However, little is known about the associations between individuals’ socioeconomic circumstances and alcohol consumption, especially heavy episodic drinking (HED; ≥5 drinks on one occasion) in low-income or middle-income countries. We investigated the association between individual and household level socioeconomic status, and alcohol drinking habits in these settings | Lancet, UK

Will overdose deaths force an end to the US ‘war on drugs’?

[Possible paywall but seems to be open access] With more than 270 people dying every day, authorities are under pressure to treat, rather than prosecute, users | FT, UK

Nikolas Cruz: What are fetal alcohol spectrum disorders and does the Parkland shooter have one?

Fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD) are conditions caused by an individual being exposed to alcohol before birth | Independent, UK

New York stores to enforce ban on whipped cream cannisters to anyone under 21 in effort to stop deadly inhaling of 'hippy crack' nitrous oxide 'whippets' - as 1 in 5 kids admit using inhalants by the time they are 13

Any store who sells a whipped cream cannister to someone under 21 will find themselves being handed a $250 fine for the first offence | Mail Online, UK

The Black mothers finding freedom in mushrooms: ‘They give us our power back’

Psilocybin can help to heal trauma, users say, but the racialized history of drugs in the US has long fueled fear | Guardian, UK

How Aussies are getting super rich investing in marijuana as cannabis company triples its revenue in a year and pays its first dividend

Cronos Australia has tripled its annual revenue to $67million in 2022 and will be the first medicinal cannabis firm in the country to pay shareholders a dividend | Mail Online, UK

Gardaí back Electric Picnic drug testing, but no amnesty for possession

'The law hasn’t changed. There is no change in legislation to facilitate the possession of illegal or controlled drugs, says Det Supt Sé McCormack | Irish Examiner, Ireland

Drug injection centres in Dublin will save lives, TD Ó Ríordáin says

The failure by the Government to deliver injection centres in Dublin is costing people their lives, Labour TD for Dublin Bay North, Aodhán Ó Ríordáin said | Dublin People, Ireland

Americans and the Future of Cigarettes, Marijuana, Alcohol

Gallup has been asking Americans about their attitudes toward cigarettes and alcohol since the 1930s and 1940s, and, in more recent decades, has added similar questions about marijuana. One purpose of these continuing surveys is to update estimates of these substances' frequency of use | GALLUP, USA

Illicit drugs are used by one in ten intensive cardiac care unit patients, study finds

Illicit drug use is associated with a nearly nine-fold greater risk of death or life-threatening emergencies in intensive cardiac care unit (ICCU) patients, according to research presented at ESC Congress 2022 | Medical Xpress, USA

One dose of alcohol is enough to modify the brain

A research team from the University of Cologne and the Universities of Mannheim and Heidelberg has found that even the single administration of alcohol permanently alters the morphology of neurons. In particular, the structure of the synapses as well as the dynamics of mitochondria are influenced by alcohol | Medical Xpress, USA

Years into a nationwide overdose epidemic, many with opioid addiction still aren't getting treatment medication

Despite improvements in treatment access as the overdose crisis has spiraled over the last decade, many people with opioid use disorder aren't getting medications to treat their addiction, a new study has found | Medical Xpress, USA

AMA calls for stronger nicotine vaping product regulation

As the take-up of vaping grows the AMA President Professor Steve Robson has written to the Federal Health Minister urging changes to legislation | AMA, USA

To plan or not to plan: Motives and contexts for planned and unplanned drinking among college students

Based on the 2019 (U.S.) National Survey on Drug Use and Health, over half of full-time college students reported drinking alcohol in the past month, while 33% reported binge drinking in the past month. This week, The DRAM reviews a study by Angela Stevens and colleagues that explored college students’ motives, social contexts, and physical contexts for unplanned and planned drinking | BASIS, USA

Does adding phone check-ins and digital recovery support services to conventional alcohol use disorder treatment improve outcomes?

Ongoing patient support after formal addiction treatment produces better outcomes than treatment on its own. This ongoing support, called “continuing care”, has traditionally been delivered through in-person or remote check-ins with providers. Continuing care can also be delivered through innovative smartphone apps that do not rely on live-time therapist interactions. This study compared traditional telephone-based continuing care, a modern smartphone app, and a combination of the two on alcohol use disorder patient outcomes after treatment | Recovery Research Institute, USA

Queensland government gets 'Dirty Ashtray Award' over e-cigarettes as survey shows widespread community concern about vaping

New research has found the majority of Queenslanders think e-cigarettes are highly addictive, vaping should be banned in many public places and vape advertising should not be allowed on social media | abc.net.au, Australia

Canberra pill testing: What the lab found in Canberra's drugs and why it's important to know

Australia's first government pill-testing service, CanTEST Health and Drug Checking, opened in Canberra in July for a six-month pilot | Canberra Times, Australia

Victorian overdose deaths, 2012-2021 (PDF)

The report is produced under the Court's initiative to release timely and accessible information on deaths to the Victorian public, and to support drug harm reduction initiatives in the community | Coroners Court of Victoria, Australia

Blogs, comment and opinion

Drug-related Deaths – just the tip of the iceberg?

[Recently] the National Records of Scotland published the latest drug-related death data, showing that Scotland continues to have the highest levels of drug-related deaths in the UK and Europe. In some ways, however, these deaths are just the tip of the iceberg | DRNS blog, UK

Scottish Pharmacy Alliance: A Drug Harms Collaborative

On 16th May 2022, the inaugural meeting of the Scottish Pharmacy Alliance: A Drug Harms Collaborative was held in Glasgow. The concept for the Scottish Pharmacy Alliance began with a conversation between two pharmacists with one shared vision: to put out an urgent call to action for the pharmacy workforce to come together and support the aim to tackle the drug deaths crisis | DRNS blog, UK

Pride in Safe Supply: The Forgotten LGBTQ+ History of Harm Reduction

It would be difficult to trace the harm reduction movement back to one specific cause, as it has roots in so many different activist groups. The movement goes as far back as The Black Panther Party’s survival programs in the late 1960s and the women’s health movement and fight for reproductive health in the 1970s, so when HIV/AIDS was tearing through the queer community in the 1980s and harm reduction became an essential piece of advocacy throughout the pandemic, it wasn’t necessarily the beginning of the movement | Volteface, UK

Doing it wrong?

More and more frequently I’m hearing self-identified and publicly recognized recovery advocates state that providing harm reduction services with the goal of moving people toward recovery or treatment constitutes “doing it wrong.” | Recovery Review blog, USA

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