With use of drugs such as ice on the rise, drug consumption rooms are now being set up in Europe to provide supervised inhalation.
A man injects himself with heroin using a needle obtained from the People’s Harm Reduction Alliance, the nation’s largest needle-exchange program, in Seattle, Washington.
David Ryder/Reuters
Why have the demographics of heroin use changed so much? For that, we can look to dramatic increase in prescriptions for opioid painkillers, such as Oxycontin or Vicodin.
Most opioid overdoses occur among experienced users.
Alexander Trinitatov/Flickr
Danny Boyle’s pop heroin fable defined an era and made the careers of everyone involved. Here are a few reasons to be wary of the sequel - and a possible happy ending.
Stigma doesn’t help.
Man on stairs via www.shutterstock.com.
Our drugs policy expert sheds some light on the Liberal Democrats’ radical new proposals.
Safe injection facilities (SIFs) offer clean syringes, bandages and antiseptics to drug users. SIFs reduce overdose deaths and limit the spread of disease.
Andy Clark/Reuters
In the 1930s, Harry J. Anslinger, the first head of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, embarked on a fierce anti-marijuana campaign. Highlighted by the 1936 anti-marijuana film Reefer Madness – where marijuana…
Housing First is a program that offers housing to homeless drug users – regardless of whether or not they’re drug free – with a goal of social recovery.
Bryan Guilas/Flickr
Over the past decade, drug use in the US has risen dramatically, with heroin use reaching epidemic proportions. The country’s policy for combating abuse has involved incarceration, abstinence-only treatment…
Opioid addicts now being armed with overdose antidote.
Gretchen Ertl/Reuters
Many first responders’ – even some university police officers – are carrying a new tool in their first-aid kits. It’s naloxone, the opioid overdose antidote drug, and today it’s more widely available than…
Britain’s heroin habit isn’t what it was.
Marcos Mesa, Sam Wordley via Shutterstock
Paul Hayes, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine
On all sides, our politicians and commentators seem convinced Britain’s drug policy has been a failure. Party conference season saw Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg rehash his old refrain that we’ve…
People overdose from illicit substances, such as heroin, or prescription medications, such as valium or opioid painkillers.
Thomas Marthinsen/Flickr
In 2012, 103,000 people around the world lost their lives to drug poisoning or overdose. As terrible as this waste of life seems, it’s important to remember that drug overdoses are not inevitably fatal…
Papering over the cracks of the war on drugs.
Agência Brasil
There are stories some people might not expect to read about Iran – and its progressive drugs policy is one. As a number of countries begin to slowly reconsider their approach towards illicit drugs, following…
Philip Seymour Hoffman’s death earlier this week from a suspected heroin overdose unleashed the usual media coverage of deaths related to this drug. While the actor’s actual cause of death has not yet…
Existing evidence for distributing naloxone to prevent overdose deaths is weak.
intropin/Flickr
It’s now almost two years since ACT chief minister and minister for health, Katy Gallagher, launched Australia’s first program to distribute naloxone to prevent heroin overdoses. Other states have followed…
Despite the billions of dollars spent on the ‘war on drugs’, a 2012 survey reported that most respondents find cannabis easy to obtain.
Periódico El Ciudadano
A sudden reduction in corporate profits has blown a $12 billion hole in the federal budget. This development should spark a debate within and outside government about how we deal with illicit drugs in…
Most overdose deaths are due to heroin but an increasing number are due to pain relieving prescription opioid drugs.
Thomas Marthinsen
Once again, overdose deaths from opioids are increasing in Australia. And once again, we are in danger of ignoring effective, evidence-based interventions. According to the National Drug and Alcohol Research…