Call for Papers: New Drug and other Behavioural Trends During Social-Distancing for the COVID-19 Pandemic

This Special Issue explores new drug and behavioural trends during the Covid-19 Pandemic. We welcome multidisciplinary contributions aimed at enhancing the understanding of how “physical distancing” and other radical changes in our lifestyles might lead to the consumption of new emerging drugs and other risky behaviours.

Potential Research Topic include, but are not limited to:

• Use, effects, markets of Novel Psychoactive Substances (NPS) and Image and Performance Enhancing Drugs (IPED).
• Use/abuse of anti-anxiety/sedative drugs, both taken under medical prescription or autonomously and at increased dosages. These may include common anxiolytic drugs, like benzodiazepines, or more potent and illicit agents like cannabinoids, opioids.

• Use of psychostimulants that provides immediate euphoric effects to counteract the anxiety and the frustration resulting from the limited or prohibited direct social relationships.

• Other types of changes in addiction (e.g. reduced drug use in recreational settings, lack of access to drugs, change in the drug market leading to a reduction in substance use, or to withdrawal-related problems/change in the kind of substance used.
• Pharmaco-toxicological effects of NPS in preclinical models and in emergency situations, including the occurrence of severe adverse effects related to the difficulty in managing acute toxicity and the complex identification of intoxication for both clinical toxicologist and medical examiner.
• Illicit drug trafficking and change in market routes, including the availability of substances in the darknet.
• Best practices and lessons learned in supporting interventions to prevent substance use disorders and other unhealthy behaviors during the pandemic.

• Challenges and modifications faced by the healthcare system in delivering treatment and care for people with substance use disorder in the epidemic context and changes in accessing social support.

Special Issue time-schedule: EM open for submissions on April 1, 2021, and manuscripts must be submitted by August 15, 2021. Submissions will undergo the normal peer-review process by the journal and the expected Special Issue publication will be in 2021.