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Daily news - 25th May 2023 |
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UK news
Drug testing at festivals - podcast
The HSE will re-introduce their drug safety scheme at Irish Festivals this year as part of their safer night programme. This will be the 2nd year of it running. The UK have been doing this for the past 10 years and Harry Shapiro, Director of Drugwise, joined Anton to discuss how effective it is and if it leads to better safety measures around drug taking | NewsTalk, UK
First UK death linked to 'zombie' drug xylazine
The death of a 43-year-old man is the first in the UK to be linked to the "zombie" drug xylazine, which is prompting overdose warnings in the US | BBC, UK
The first drug-related death associated with xylazine use in the UK and Europe
[Open access] On November 8th, 2022, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a statement alerting healthcare professionals to the increasing prevalence of xylazine in illicit drug overdoses in the country. Xylazine is a veterinary medicine with sedative, analgesic and muscle relaxant properties that is used as a heroin/fentanyl adulterant on the illicit drug market in North America. Here we report the first drug-related death associated with xylazine in the United Kingdom | Journal of Forensic and Legal Medicine, UK
Impact of the cost-of-living crisis on the nature of attempts to stop smoking and to reduce alcohol consumption in Great Britain: A representative population survey, 2021–2022
Smoking and excessive drinking place a strain on household budgets. We aimed to examine the impact of the cost-of-living crisis in Great Britain on the nature of smoking cessation and alcohol reduction attempts, and explore changes in health professionals offering support | PLOS One, UK
Suggestion for GPs to take greater role in treatment of alcohol dependency
The failure of the Government to tackle harm from alcohol dependency over the past decade has led to a serious public health crisis, influential MPs have warned. Deaths have risen by 89% over the past 20 years including a sharper increase since the start of the pandemic yet the number of people receiving treatment for alcohol dependency has been falling, the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) said | Pulse Today, UK
Vaping: How do you quit e-cigarettes?
Quitting ain't easy. But vaping's helped millions of people to ditch traditional cigarettes. It's widely considered less harmful than smoking tobacco - and the UK government endorses vapes as a quitting aid. But what do you do when you want to take the next step and quit completely? | BBC, UK
Alcohol use in the cost-of-living crisis
Thu, 22 Jun 2023 14:00 - 15:00 BST. Join the Institute of Alcohol Studies and Director of Public Health for Gateshead, Alice Wiseman, to hear from Dr Philip Broadbent (Specialty Registrar in Public Health Medicine) and Holly Wood (With You) on how the cost-of-living crisis is impacting public health, particularly in relation to levels of alcohol harm | IAS, UK
Man died of drug overdose after 21st birthday party
A man died from a drug overdose while still in police custody following a party to celebrate his 21st birthday, a fatal accident inquiry (FAI) has found | BBC, UK
International news
One in five deaths among young Californians tied to fentanyl
Drug overdoses kill two to three times as many in state as car accidents, data shows | Guardian, UK
HSE gives go-ahead for new services for people with psychiatric and drug disorders
Specialist treatment services for adults with both drug and mental health disorders are to be established in Cork and Clare as part of a promised national care service. The HSE has given the green light to a network of 12 adult dual diagnosis teams and four adolescent teams. The first adolescent team is planned for North Dublin. Outside these three teams, the other nine teams will depend on available resources | Irish Examiner, Ireland
Analysis of the relationship between addiction treatment data and geographic deprivation in Ireland (PDF)
The aim of this small-scale research project was to demonstrate the potential for geographic analysis of the HRB addiction (alcohol and other drugs) treatment data when mapped onto area-based disadvantage using the Pobal HP Deprivation Index | HRB, Ireland
Trends in Illicit Ketamine Seizures in the US From 2017 to 2022
Ketamine is a dissociative anesthetic that has been used in medicine for a half century, with recent trials demonstrating efficacy of esketamine (an enantiomer of ketamine) for treatment-resistant depression. In 2019, the US Food and Drug Administration approved the use of esketamine to treat this condition, although off-label use of racemic ketamine is now common. It is unclear whether extensive media coverage about the therapeutic benefits of ketamine and esketamine has influenced nonmedical or recreational use. In this cross-sectional study, we investigated seizures of illicit ketamine in the US from 2017 through 2022 as a measure of availability of ketamine for nonmedical use | JAMA Psychiatry, USA
Opioid overdose survivors face higher odds for death in following year
Surviving a trip to the emergency room for an opioid overdose dramatically increases a patient's odds of dying in the year after, U.S. health officials reported Tuesday | Medical Express, USA
Study measures perceived levels of harmful chemicals in e-cigarettes compared with cigarettes
About half of cigarette smokers and young adult non-smokers think that nicotine-based electronic cigarettes have the same amount or even more harmful chemicals than regular tobacco-based cigarettes, according to a Rutgers study | News Medical, USA
Are flavored e-cigarette bans effective?
In a recent study posted to the medRxiv* preprint server, researchers explore the effects of flavored e-cigarette bans on the use of e-cigarettes | News Medical, USA
Pharmacists Can Educate Patients, Provide Counseling for Smoking Cessation
Smoking is a common issue encountered in health care that can have serious serious consequences, such as increased risk of cancer and coronary heart disease and serious morbidity and mortality. With the presence of prescription and OTC smoking cessation products, pharmacists have an opportunity to help educate patients to recognize the dangers of smoking and provide opportunities to quit smoking | Pharmacy Times, USA
The Way Forward for Cannabis and Racial Justice
The way forward first involves looking back. It requires us to acknowledge and understand the history that led us to where we are today. It allows us to always be aware of the weight of that history—a century of racism and injustice. That oppression was inflicted on communities day by day, year by year, neighborhood by neighborhood with one heavy-handed tactic after another | Filter Magazine, USA
Methamphetamine use is on the rise, worsening Canada’s already complex opioid crisis
Over the past decade, Dr. Bach, an internal medicine and addiction medicine specialist at St. Paul’s Hospital in Vancouver and co-medical director at the British Columbia Centre on Substance Use, has noticed the use of methamphetamine skyrocket, adding another layer of complexity to the opioids epidemic | Globe and Mail, Canada
Unpacking assertions made by the alcohol industry and how they make them: An analysis of submissions into Australia's National Alcohol Strategy
Alcohol is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality globally. One significant barrier to the implementation of evidence-based alcohol policy is alcohol industry opposition. Making submissions to national policy processes is one way in which the industry exert influence. The aim of this study was to analyse alcohol industry submissions into Australia's National Alcohol Strategy to determine key assertions made by the alcohol industry and the ways in which they use evidence and refute the effectiveness of public health policies to make their claims | DAR, Australia
Ban won’t stop vapes flooding in: Border Force chief
The head of the Australian Border Force says the government’s plan to abolish retail vape sales is a “work in progress” with no funding attached to the crackdown in this month’s federal budget | SMH, Australia
Trends in pharmaceutical stimulant use among a sample of people who regularly use ecstasy and/or other illicit stimulants in Perth, WA, 2007-2022
Data was collected as part of the Ecstasy and Related Drugs Reporting System (EDRS). Annual interviews were conducted with people residing in Perth who used ecstasy and/or other illicit stimulants monthly or more frequently and were aged 18 or older | NDARC, Australia
Blogs, comment and opinion
Targets For Drug Strategy Published
The Government has just (22 May 2023) published the targets for its drug strategy. The National Combating Drugs Outcomes Framework Supporting metrics and technical guidance provides a single set of metrics to measure national and local progress and help delivery partners structure and scrutinise their work. The guidance makes it clear that all relevant partners, including local authorities, the NHS, police, probation and prisons, should contribute to – and are jointly accountable for – all outcomes and elements of the strategy | Russell Webster, UK
What universities should do about drugs
We can all agree that universities have a duty of care to all our young people that come to campus every year. A part of this is the reality that many students will use both legal and illegal drugs at one point or another. It is accepted that the old-time approach of “just say no” does not work, so universities must be more pragmatic in their approach and implementing harm reduction is key | Transform, UK
The acmd – the experts who are there to be ignored
The upcoming ban on possession of Nitrous Oxide is the latest in a long history of expert advice and evidence being ignored in UK drugs policy-making, in favour of short term, politically motivated crackdowns, writes Jay Jackson | Volteface, UK
Emily Carver: Vaping. Say no to the nanny state – but yes to better law enforcement
Last week, I decided to stop vaping. I’d never been a big smoker of regular cigarettes, indulging only after a glass of wine or two with friends. But there was something different about the little e-cigarette. They’re discreet, compact and, crucially, they don’t leave you smelling like an ashtray | Conservative Home, UK
A Morphia industry in India?: Entwined interests of colonial science, medicine and commerce
In 1829, at a meeting of the Westminster Medical Society, a group of physicians wondered why the ‘East India Opium’ was being overlooked in favour of the opium from Turkey, particularly when the efficacy and purity of the former and the quantity of morphia that it yielded had been extremely positive from the results of its analysis by medical institutions and practitioners. Opium from Smyrna (present day Izmir, Western Turkey) and Constantinople (present day Istanbul), dominated the world market for raw opium then, and there was much concern among a section of intellectuals on the need to end Britain’s dependency on Turkish opium | Points blog, USA
Hallucinations in the movies tend to be about chaos, violence and mental distress. But they can be positive too
Hallucinations are often depicted in the movies as terrifying experiences. Think Jake Gyllenhaal seeing a monstrous rabbit in Donnie Darko, Leonardo DiCaprio experiencing the torture of Shutter Island, Natalie Portman in Black Swan, or Joaquin Phoenix as the Joker | Conversation, Australia