Children: Real and Lasting Casualties of Domestic, Familial and Intimate Partner Violence - The AOD Connection

The reporting on this social justice and welfare impacting catastrophe remains not only sporadic but, it is incomplete in scope and context particularly around alcohol and other drug (AOD) issues. Just one report stated that; Nearly three in 10 young people felt that alcohol and drugs was a problem for their family and peers. Heavy drinking and drug use has placed thousands of high school students at a disadvantage in life, but they’re not the ones with the problem.  

Previous reports clearly show substance use contributes to not only neglect but direct harms to children, but over recent years the identifying and quantifying of specific impacts of alcohol and other drugs on the harms and neglects on children have either been ignored, or collapsed into broader ‘mental health’ data. So why the drift toward a lack of clear delineation? At the very least drug use could mentioned as a comorbidity and not removed from the data set altogether. This paper asks questions around the concerns of this disturbing trend in reporting.