11 November 2009

DRUGS

Injection Drug Use and Related Risk Behaviors (29th October 2009)
Combined 2006 to 2008 data, from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, indicate that an annual average of 425,000 persons aged 12 or older (0.17 percent) used a needle to inject heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine, or other stimulants during the past year. 13.0 percent of past year injection drug users had used a needle that they knew or suspected someone else had used before them the last time they used a needle to inject drugs, and less than one third (29.0 percent) of them cleaned the needle with bleach prior to their last injection. More than one half (52.8 percent) of past year injection drug users purchased the last needle they used from a pharmacy, and 12.4 percent obtained the needle through a needle exchange program.
Report

Estimating drug harms: a risky business? (October 2009)
Taking a drug is not currently illegal in the UK, and while there have been attempts to make it so, the most reasoned arguments suggest this is not a particularly useful way of reducing harm.

In this edited transcript of the 2009 Eve Saville lecture Professor Nutt discusses drug regulation and control, drugs politics and suggests a way forward on the drugs debate.
Publication

2009 Annual report: the state of the drugs problem in Europe (November 2009)
The report on the state of the drugs problem in Europe presents the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addictions (EMCDDA's) yearly overview of the drug phenomenon. This is an essential reference book for policymakers, specialists and practitioners in the drugs field or indeed anyone seeking the latest findings on drugs in Europe. Published every autumn, the report contains non-confidential data supported by an extensive range of figures.
Report

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