Search
Public health
The intersection of substance use with broader public health concerns.
Crime and Social Impacts of Alcohol
Alcohol-related crime and social disorder is estimated to cost UK taxpayers £11bn per year, at 2010/11 prices.[1]
Alcohol-related crime makes up a substantial portion of violent offences across the UK (47% in England and Wales in 2014/15...
Reviewing England's Drug Misuse Treatment System
Public Health England’s recently published review reveals that the country’s drug misuse treatment system is performing well. However, there are still several areas that call for improvements.
Amongst the report’s findings, notable are:
...
Plans for a Smoke-Free Finland Gather Pace
Finland plans to cut consumption of tobacco products - in any form – to less than 2% among adults by 2040. As is the case with many industrialised countries, Finland’s smoking rates have decreased in recent years as a result of various...
New Online Training for Practitioners, Peer Mentors and Service Managers
This new platform allows substance misuse, probation and prison services to upskill their workforces in a scalable and consistent way, and optimise their use of the digital behaviour change programme Breaking Free.
Service providers can...
Healthy Nightlife Toolbox - Resources for Creating Safer Nightlife Settings
The Healthy Nightlife Toolbox (HNT) is an international initiative that focuses on the reduction of harm from alcohol and drug use among young people.
The Healthy Nightlife Toolbox collects and provides information on evidence-based...
Free Resource for Evaluating Drug Prevention and Treatment Interventions
The Evaluation Instruments Bank (EIB) is an online database of freely available resources for evaluating drug prevention and treatment programmes and initiatives. You can search the archive by type of intervention (treatment or prevention)...
Tobacco and Cancer: Epidemiology and New Perspectives of Prevention and Monitoring in Mexico
Tobacco smoking is a causal risk factor of at least 16 different types of cancer. In Mexico, smoking causes 6,035 premature deaths annually of lung cancer and 5,154 from other types. Additionally, 16,408 new smoking attributable cases are...
The Public Health Burden of Alcohol and the Effectiveness and Cost-Effectiveness of Alcohol Control Policies
This review was commissioned by the Department of Health, which asked Public Health England (PHE) to provide an overview of alcohol-related harm in England and possible policy solutions. The present report offers a broad and rigorous...
What is the Purpose of Community Alcohol Partnerships?
Community Alcohol Partnerships (CAPs) are local initiatives which aim to reduce alcohol-related harm. They involve forming partnerships between the drinks industry and local governments with a particular focus on alcohol abuse and anti...
Parental Socioeconomic Status and Teenage Smoking Rates: What's the Link?
In what way is parental socioeconomic status associated with nicotine dependence in children?
This is the question a new study conducted in Norway aimed to find out. The study measured parental socioeconomic status by looking at...
Treating Alcohol Addiction with Positive Relationships
A ‘therapeutic alliance’, or in other words, a positive and trusting relationship between counsellor and patient, could be the key to successful treatment of alcohol addiction, according to a new study. Patients who reported a more positive...
ESPAD Report 2015
The European Schools Survey Project on Alcohol and Other Drugs (ESPAD) collects comparable data on substance use among 15- to 16-year-old students. It monitors drug usage trends within, as well as, between European countries.
The latest...
Healthier Alternatives and Natural Highs: The Success of the Icelandic Model
Over the past two decades, Iceland has seen teenage smoking, drinking and drug use dramatically decrease. This is partly because of state-funded initiatives which look to promote healthier alternatives, or ‘natural highs’, such as sport, family-orientated activities and cultural provisions.
Alcohol Switches the Brain into 'Starvation Mode'
Alcohol has a very high calorie content. Experts, therefore, have long been confused as to why people often eat more after having consumed alcoholic drinks. New scientific tests show spikes in electrical activity in the brains of mice when...
A Sip as a Kid, Alcohol Problems as an Adult?
Introducing children to alcohol by way of their parents allowing them sips or tasters of their own drinks is typically viewed as the presiding method used in European countries.
Published in the journal Psychological Medicine, a new...
Revealed: The Global Cost of Smoking
Smoking and its related harms cost the world more than $1 trillion and claim the lives of around 6 million people each year, according to a new report from the World Health Organization (WHO) and the National Cancer Institute.
$1...
The Multiple Health Effects of Marijuana Use
In its first report for almost 20 years, the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), has found the use of marijuana seems to be particularly connected to:
- Breathing problems
- Mental health issues such as psychosis, social anxiety and...
Neural Processing, Risky Behaviour and Cocaine Use
According to new research published in the journal Biological Psychiatry: Cognitive Neuro-science and Neuroimaging, compared to people without a drug problem, cocaine addicts tend to make riskier choices after losing out on a potential...
Alcohol Advertising Linked to Youth Drinking
Health researchers worldwide have provided new evidence suggesting that alcohol advertising is often aggressive, reaching children, and is linked with youth drinking.
The Australian organisation, the National Alliance for Action on...
The Regulation of Alcohol Marketing: From Research to Public Health Policy
A series of reports in a supplement to the scientific journal Addiction presents the latest evidence on alcohol marketing and its impact on children. Key findings from the collection of peer-reviewed manuscripts include:
- Exposure to...