Drug News

PRESCRIPTION DRUGS – USA
Arrests mark U.S. prescription drug abuse crackdown – Reuters

U.S. authorities arrested 22 people in Florida on Friday, including pharmacists and doctors, in a crackdown against prescription drug abuse that officials say is the nation’s fastest growing drug problem.

PRESCRIPTION DRUGS – USA
Tennessee drug task force waging lonely war on Rx diversion – KnoxNews
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Tennessee created a statewide task force on prescription-drug abuse four years ago and never set aside a penny to fund it. The state Drug Diversion Task Force subsists on volunteer efforts in its battle against Tennessee’s most widespread drug problem. “Everybody thinks we get money,” said Elizabeth Sherrod, the task force coordinator. “We get nothing. Speakers at our meetings travel at their own expense.”

PRESCRIPTION DRUGS – USA
Expert on drug abuse tells local conference that fatal overdoses are rising – Herald
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For the first time in 2010, the leading cause of accidental death in the country was from accidental fatal overdose with prescription opiates as the primary drug involved.

PRESCRIPTION DRUGS – USA
Prescription drug abuse video contest launched for Ky. high school students – WPSD Local 6

Kentucky high school students are being asked to enter a video contest as part of efforts to educate the public about the dangers of prescription drug addiction.

ALCOHOL/DRUG ABUSE – USA
Talk to children about drugs, alcohol – Auburn Citizen
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Did you know that the average American has his or her first drink around age 14? According to the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse, almost 80 percent of high school students have tried alcohol. In an average month, about 9 million Americans teens drink alcohol. A study done recently by the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center states that underage alcohol use happens between fifth and sixth grade!

ALCOHOL ABUSE – UGANDA
Excessive Alcohol Consumption is a key to chronic poverty in Uganda – New Vision
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Excessive Alcohol Consumption is a key ‘’driver and maintainer’’ of chronic poverty in Uganda. The reason why excessive consumption of alcohol has become a new frontier for chronic poverty in Uganda is that, the discussion on excessive alcohol consumption in the country has for long been in the back –seat of what is considered to be ‘’ personal choices.’’ This mentality has hindered attempts to bring the issue into the public domain and the frontline of public policy.

METHAMPHETAMINE – USA
Baby seller case: Not first time a child taken from Fousek because of meth exposure – Mercury News

A jury Tuesday convicted a Salinas man of endangering the baby girl he exposed to methamphetamine and offered to sell in a Walmart parking lot last year. What the jury did not know, and what Judge Pamela Butler will take into consideration when sentencing Patrick Fousek, is that it’s not the first time one of his children has been taken from him because of methamphetamine exposure.

PARTY DRUGS – UK
Party drug meow meow kills one young Briton a week – Daily Mail

Banned last year, mephedrone is blamed for causing a further 19 users to commit suicide. Children are also at risk from the increasing availability of so-called ‘legal highs’, a Home Office report found

DRUG ADDICTION – USA
Mother recounts son’s synthetic drug addiction – The Daily News Journal

Wyant’s son, 20-year-old Dylan Evans, is currently recovering in a drug rehab facility from a year-long addiction to Molly’s Plant Food that ended with Evans overdosing on prescription medication.

DRUG REHAB – THAILAND
Drug rehab programme attracts 500 applicants on first day – The Nation

As many as 500 drug addicts applied for the drug-rehabilitation programme when it was launched yesterday.

DRUG ADDICTION – USA
Columbia Students Accused of Drug Dealing – New York Daily News

Lawyers for an alleged cartel of Columbia students busted for campus drug dealing complained Tuesday a judge was picking on their clients because they are Ivy Leaguers.

DRUG ADDICTION/REHAB – USA
Giving welfare to drug users just enables abuse – Des Moines Register

Drug abusers instead need to be in programs that treat their addiction. Unfortunately, many people need to hit rock bottom before they enter rehab. Is paying them money to prolong their habit really helping them?

PRESCRIPTION DRUGS/ALCOHOL ABUSE – USA
Pharmaceuticals outpace alcohol as drug of choice in Bay County – The Bay City Times

Bay County has long had a reputation as a home of heavy drinkers, but another demon has edged out alcohol as the most abused substance. In 2010, for the first time ever, more Bay County residents sought treatment for prescription drug abuse than for alcohol addiction.

ALCOHOL ABUSE – USA
Binge Drinking Costs U.S. Billions – Ashland Current

The cost of excessive alcohol consumption in the United States in 2006 reached $223.5 billion or about $1.90 per drink. Researchers found the costs largely resulted from losses in workplace productivity (72 percent of the total cost), health care expenses for problems caused by excessive drinking (11 percent of the total cost), law enforcement and other criminal justice expenses related to excessive alcohol consumption (nine percent of the total cost), and motor vehicle crash costs from impaired driving (six percent of the total cost).

HEROIN – USA
Neighborhood flyers advertise heroin for sale – WNEM

Oregon police say a group of suspected drug dealers handed out flyers advertising “heroin for sale.” Police moved in to the well known “heroin house” and arrested six people. Inside, cops found a small meth lab, drugs, guns and cash.

ECSTASY – UK
Academic attempted suicide over drugs death – The Independent
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A university lecturer has admitted possessing drugs after a teenage girl died when she took ecstasy from his hidden stash during a party thrown by his daughter in his home. Brian Dodgeon, 61, tried to kill himself a week later in remorse.

MARIJUANA – USA
Pot smoking may more than double crash risk – USA Today

Drivers who get behind the wheel after using marijuana run more than twice the risk of crashing compared to others, a new study finds.

DRUG REHAB – USA
30 Days in a Drug Rehab: A Shortchange, Not a Shortcut – San Francisco Gate

Many people that continue to relapse after leaving treatment may not need more of the same but longer stays in treatment before being discharged.

PRESCRIPTION DRUGS – USA
Rx for Danger: Total weight of pills, not amount of drugs in them, triggers longer sentences – Orlando Sentinel

Todd Hannigan wanted to end his life. He ended up with a 15-year-prison sentence instead. Two years ago, Hannigan, now 43, took a bottle of Natural Light and 31 of his mother’s painkillers to Orlando’s Cherry Tree Park, where a police officer caught him drinking the beer at a picnic table.

ALCOHOL – USA
How alcohol use was cut at two Seattle schools – The Seattle Times
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Alcohol use at Nathan Hale and Roosevelt high schools has nearly been cut in half in the past four years. How did they do it?

HEROIN – USA
Overdoses indicate heroin use up in Saginaw – Chicago Tribune

A rise in the number of heroin overdose cases in Saginaw has authorities worried wider use of the drug is making a comeback.

METHAMPHETAMINE – AUSTRALIA
Surge in crystal meth use prompts concern at mental health effects – Syndey Morning Herald
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Use of crystal methamphetamine, or ice, by drug users in Australia has increased significantly since last year, research shows. Almost half of injecting drug users and a quarter of regular ecstasy users this year reported using ice in the previous six months

ECSTASY – USA
Man faces 20 years on Ecstasy charge – Daily Comet‎

NEW ORLEANS – A 27-year-old Gretna man faces up to 20 years in prison after pleading guilty to conspiring to traffic in the synthetic drug Ecstasy.

ALCOHOL – USA
Two-Question Screen Can Help Doctors Spot Teen Alcohol Problems – Time Healthland

Two questions asked during a regular pediatrician’s visit could help identify youth with drinking problems.

ALCOHOL/DRUG ADDICTION – USA
Alcoholism, Drug Addiction Among Seniors Expected To Triple By 2020 – Huffington Post

The aging boomer population — which is now facing financial strain, job loss, declining health, and grieving the death of a parent — has some addiction experts concerned.

PRESCRIPTION DRUGS – USA
Misuse of legal drugs increasing – The Province

The arrest of more than three dozen people on drug charges at a Boeing military aircraft plant highlights the growing problem of prescription drug abuse in U.S. workers. Even with the gaps in testing, evidence shows that prescription drug abuse on the job is on the rise. Forty per cent more American workers tested positive for opiates, or painkillers.

DRUG ADDICTION – UK
Ending Drug Prohibition and Emancipating the Addict – the Last Frontier in a Struggle for Enlightenment – Huffington Post

The UK is rife with talk of drug legalisation. First, because most illicit drug use is either benign or at least innocuous. Second, because even when addiction is involved, punishment is not the right answer. Third, because the prohibition of drugs has really been a mess – both costly and futile. Unsurprisingly, many oppose these imminent changes.

ALCOHOL ABUSE – USA
BRiDGES Receives Grant to Address Underage Drinking Among College Students – Madison County Courier

The New York State Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services (OASAS) Commissioner Arlene González-Sánchez recently announced federal grant awards totaling $100,000 to five statewide prevention providers to address underage drinking among college students.

DRUG ADDICTION – USA
Drug legalization: Wrong lesson of Prohibition – Baltimore Sun
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Prohibition — America’s notoriously “failed social experiment” to rid the country of alcohol — took center stage this past week as PBS broadcast Ken Burns’ highly acclaimed series on the subject. And already, it has been seized on by drug-legalization advocates who say it proves that drug prohibition should be abandoned. But a closer look at what resulted from alcohol prohibition and its relevance to today’s anti-drug effort reveals a far more nuanced picture than the legalization lobby might like to admit.

COCAINE – USA
Colombian Drug Lord Pleads Guilty, Cooperates with Prosecutors – Fox News
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A Colombian drug lord who moved tons of cocaine into the U.S. pleaded guilty – and is now cooperating with authorities. Jaime Alberto Marín-Zamora, 47, who smuggled at least 30 tons of cocaine into the country, pleaded guilty to a single cocaine trafficking conspiracy charge.

PARTY DRUGS – UK
Stonham Aspal/Ipswich: Mother’s party drug warning after son takes his life – East Anglian Daily Times

A mother has warned of the lethal dangers of party drugs after her son killed himself while trying to beat his addiction to the little-known substance GBL.

PRESCRIPTION DRUGS – USA
Drug-awareness training planned for UA freshmen – Arizona Daily Star
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Hundreds of freshmen will get drug-abuse awareness training at the University of Arizona this week. It’s part of a week of educational activities planned by college students, partly in remembrance of a popular fraternity member who died after overdosing on prescription drugs and alcohol at a party in April.

PRESCRIPTION DRUGS – USA
Prescription pills fuel crime, treatment in Maine – Portland Daily Sun

A recent string of pharmacy robberies in the Portland area has seized the attention of local law enforcement. City investigators are still working to identify the people or single individual responsible for demanding an undisclosed amount and type of pharmaceutical drug from three Portland CVS pharmacies.

HEROIN/PRESCRIPTION DRUGS – USA
Pain pills and heroin ravaging the suburbs – The Seattle Times
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“The drugs completely take over,” Stelcher said. “It was killing me. If I’d had it my way, I would have been dead.” His wife got him into rehab.

DRUG REHAB – USA
Massive cuts could close almost every state drug rehab – Northwest Cable News
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Proposed cuts from DSHS would close almost every outpatient drug treatment center, methadone clinic and detox facility in Washington.

PRESCRIPTION DRUGS – USA
Medical professionals deal with patients’ suffering, addiction – The Mountain Press
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“The problem is the prescription drug abuse is so out of control, we see patients who are there (in the emergency room) for the wrong reasons on an hourly basis.”

DRUG REHAB – USA
Matt Hardy Now Facing Drug Charges – Southern Pines Pilot
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On Monday, Matt Hardy (Hardy Boyz – six-time World Wrestling Entertainment World Tag Team Champions) posted a video online saying that the last two months have “definitely been the worst months of my career” and that he plans to seek treatment. “I have made the voluntary decision to go to rehab and get myself together.

ALCOHOL/DRUG ABUSE – USA
WWU has launched two campaigns to address student drinking, drug use – The News Tribune

BELLINGHAM – In the longstanding struggle to curb alcohol abuse among college students, Western Washington University launched two campaigns this year to provide students with accurate, non-judgmental information about alcohol and drugs.

DRUG REHAB – USA
Steel Magnolia’s Joshua Scott Jones enters rehab – CBS News
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Jones, the male half of duo Steel Magnolia, has entered treatment for alcohol and substance abuse.

MARIJUANA – USA
Relaxed state laws blamed for increase in marijuana use – Contra Costa Times
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“It is disturbing to see an increase among kids,” Jones said. “Society is getting to the point where (marijuana is) more and more acceptable. It’s why we’re so adamant not to allow it. We want to keep it out of the hands of kids.

PRESCRIPTION DRUGS – USA
Boeing arrest points to US workplace drug problems – Reuters
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The arrest of more than three dozen people on drug charges at a Boeing (BA.N) military aircraft plant highlights the growing problem of prescription drug abuse by U.S. workers, experts said on Friday.