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Daily news - 14th January 2026

UK news

Impact statement: 10 Year Health Plan for England

The 10 Year Health Plan for England is part of the government’s health mission to build a health service fit for the future. The plan describes 3 shifts to reinvent the NHS: from hospital to community, from analogue to digital and from sickness to prevention, supported by a wider set of system changes to improve population health and make the NHS fit for the future. This impact statement explains the rationale for, and potential effects of, a number of strategies outlined in the plan. Information is included on measures to address alcohol, tobacco and other drug use | DHSC, UK

UK's first legal drug consumption room registers almost 600 users

Since opening on 13 January 2025, The Thistle has been accessed 11,348 times and used for 7,827 injections of illegal drugs. Staff on site also managed 93 medical emergencies | BBC, UK

[Open access] Alcohol companies frequently use sports sponsorship to maintain high visibility, even in jurisdictions with advertising restrictions. Strategies such as alibi marketing - using brand-associated slogans, colours, or fonts in place of explicit brand names, and NoLo marketing - promoting zero-alcohol variants of core brands, enable continued brand exposure. This study investigates young people's awareness of alcohol sponsorship and their perceptions of alibi and NoLo marketing in sports contexts | IJDP, UK

WithYou provide expert insight on BBC investigation into increase in young people accessing drug and alcohol services

On 13 January 2026, the BBC published their investigation into the growing number of young people accessing drug and alcohol treatment across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland in 2024-25 | WithYou, UK

Alcohol Focus Scotland announces Carolyn Lochhead as new Chief Executive

Carolyn joins Alcohol Focus Scotland from the Scottish Federation of Housing Associations, where she is Director of External Affairs, a post she has held since 2021. She brings with her a wealth of leadership experience across health, housing, policy, research and campaigning | Alcohol Focus Scotland, UK

Drugs: Misuse

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if his Department will review the Mental Health Act 1983 to ensure people with co-occurring mental health and substance misuse needs are not excluded from treatment | They work for you, UK

Alcoholic Drinks: Electronic Tagging

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what the total cost was of procuring, fitting, and monitoring alcohol tags in each of the last three years | They work for you, UK

Banbury Market: Visitors to receive stop smoking advice

Free support to stop smoking is coming to Banbury this week, which is part of a wider campaign to dispel myths around stress relief | Oxford Mail, UK

Lidl given permission to sell alcohol at new store

City public health officials had said they did not want cans of super-strength alcohol sold individually, given Wolverhampton had one of the highest alcohol-specific mortality rates in the country. They with later withdrew their objection after taking legal advice and the council gave permission to sell alcohol between 07:00 and 23:00 GMT | BBC, UK

Plan to decriminalise cannabis is 'new approach' [Jersey]

A Jersey politician has said a proposal to decriminalise cannabis will bring "a new approach" to laws and attitudes to the drug on the island. Deputy Tom Coles said the proposal brought by health minister Deputy Tom Binet was "well balanced and thought through". The States Assembly will vote on the proposal, which would mean people are no longer prosecuted for possession of small amounts of cannabis, on 3 February | BBC, UK

How to spot illicit cigarettes - video

Gethin Jones and Helen Skelton investigate the dangers of illegal tobacco with former detective sergeant Marc Cananur | BBC iPlayer, UK

Pair who created cannabis factory inside old fancy dress shop jailed

Police discovered 300 cannabis plants worth £160,000 over three floors of the former U Need Us store in Portsmouth | Independent, UK

International news

69% of Gen Z use drugs "daily or weekly" to cope with work stress

In a survey of 1,000 US workers, 34% of respondents said they use drugs on the job | MixMag, UK

Global report on the use of alcohol taxes, 2025

This report provides a global assessment of taxes applied to alcoholic beverages in 2024. It is an update to the first assessment undertaken in 2022. It qualitatively compares their design and provides estimates of standardized metrics to measure tax levels across countries | WHO, Switzerland

Abnormally slow heart rate associated with xylazine-fentanyl overdose

Researchers have identified bradycardia—an abnormally low heart rate—as a symptom of xylazine-opioid overdose. This breakthrough finding from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai may help emergency medicine physicians detect whether patients have been exposed to xylazine, a drug that is increasingly found as an additive to the illicit fentanyl supply | Medical Xpress, USA

More surgical patients are on opioid use disorder medications, and hospitals must modernize pain care

As more Americans receive treatment for opioid-use disorder, that progress is increasingly showing up in the operating room, creating an urgent need to modernize how pain is managed during and after major surgery, according to a study in the February 2026 issue of Anesthesiology | Medical Xpress, USA

[Open access] The aim of this study was to develop evidence-informed recommendations on the health effects of e-cigarettes to guide healthcare practitioners and the public to balance individual and population harm reduction | IJDP, USA

STASH, Vol. 22(1) – Subjective experiences of patients undergoing psilocybin-assisted treatment for methamphetamine use disorder

People suffering from methamphetamine use disorder have few effective treatment options, as there are no approved medications, psychosocial interventions show modest effects, and contingency management, which has demonstrated efficacy for this condition, is not routinely available. This week, STASH revies a study by Jonathan Brett and colleagues that explored how patients with methamphetamine use disorder experience a treatment package consisting of psychotherapy and psilocybin, a psychedelic | BASIS, USA

Study finds non-hallucinogenic psilocybin neural receptor: A novel target for treating depression and anxiety

Psilocybin—the psychedelic compound that occurs naturally in certain "magic" mushroom species—has been shown in trials to provide long-term treatment for depression and anxiety. But the chemical's hallucinogenic effects can make developing treatments expensive and pose significant risks to people living with other psychiatric illnesses | Medical Xpress, USA

Maryland Scrubs the Term “Harm Reduction” From Key Grant Program

The Maryland Department of Health has scrubbed any mention of “harm reduction” from the state’s leading grant program for organizations that provide care to people who use drugs. The move raises questions about whether it’s a pragmatic terminology shift to guard against federal threats, or outright capitulation to the federal government’s assault on public health | Filter Magazine, USA

Work hard, play hard?

New research led by Flinders University reveals that while workplace factors like long hours, work-related stress and shift work do influence high-risk drinking, personal and social factors play an even bigger role | Flinders University, Australia

Blogs, comment and opinion

How I broke free of cannabis, and you can too

Just because marijuana is now a legalized, ubiquitous $32-billion business that’s outpacing alcohol to become America’s drug of choice doesn’t mean it’s good for you. The 21-year-old pot emporium clerk advising you which gummies to take for insomnia is not a physician or licensed pharmacist. While doctor-prescribed THC and CBD medicines help patients with debilitating illnesses like cancer, HIV/AIDS and pediatric seizure disorders, a new review of other cannabis uses found little evidence of benefits | LATimes voices, USA

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