1. The Uni of NSW have formalised a web presence for their Drug Policy Modelling Program and it contains some useful info on rates of drug use, policy documents and tools for researchers.

2. The ANCD have announced award category for the Drug and Alcohol Awards held each year: Excellence in School Drug Education. It’s noteworthy that of the 12 criteria, not one is related to health outcomes.

Over the past two months I’ve had a larger than expected response to this blog’s launch. People are glad that there’s a web-based place to debate AOD issues, although the number of people debating is very small at present. Like a lot of other people in the field I get my AOD news from a huge range of sources: industry newsletters / magazines, ADCA update email list, mainstream media, NGO and peak body press releases, Australian blogs and international blogs.

What I’m asking of readers is: would you find it useful to have a site where all this info is available in one place? A news portal where each day the latest news links, publication links and any other data can be seen?

Your thoughts greatly appreciated. I’m willing to expand the site to that level but would need to know there was support for such a service – and yes, it would be free.

The National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre has flagged a report titled Australians and Cannabis which provides some interesting information about the attitude of Australians toward cannabis.

The most interesting data from the survey:

1. A hardening in attitude of younger age groups toward cannabis use
2. A greater belief that governments should be doing more about cannabis use
3. That only 10% of those surveyed sourced health information from a drug or alcohol service.

The last point fascinates me in particular – usage rates of drug and alcohol services on a health promotion level have traditionally been low, but it seems that not a lot of progress has been made. Are agencies getting better at education via traditional or new media sources or is there still the issue of professionals sitting in their agencies waiting for their community to interact with them? I find it hard to believe that such a philosophy would exist. Has anyone got thoughts to share?

One of the things I’d like to do on the Drug Blog is post information from regular readers. One such reader is Greg Iverson, who’s put forward the following thoughts, based on some recent emails on the ADCA Update list:

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Is it just me or is anyone else gob-smacked by the constant lies,
half-truths and stream of misinformation that comes out places like the DFA
and the variety of individuals involved with that group?

I thought that they were a Christian based group – at least, the majority of
the lead members of the DFA seem to be heavily involved in their respective
churches.

Now, and pardon me if I am wrong here, but don’t these same people preach
that one should avoid lying or ‘bearing false witness’ at all costs?

How do they balance the fact that they deliberately send out misleading (and
sometimes, straight out false) information and their supposed Christian
values on telling the truth?

All I can see that this tactic does, is to stop any actual accurate
information that they may come across to be dismissed as more of the same
ill-informed rhetoric (not very smart on their behalf if you ask me). We
have learnt from prior experience that the information that they send out
cannot be relied upon – it has been shown on the Drugtalk list in many previous
cases.

Hypocrisy is never a pretty thing to see.

Is it done to catch the attention of the media (who will always look for
sensationalism)? Is it being done as a spoiling tactic to stop actual good
work and information from being disseminated? Is it due to some outdated
determination to stick to a dogma?

I am not saying that all people involved in these groups behave in this
manner, but there certainly seems to be a hard core group on DrugTalk
and Update that are not great advertisements for their various religious
bodies that they proudly claim to represent. I’d be interested to hear
others suggestion on this

At least Colliss – although I feel he is more often than not wrong in his
opinions – doesn’t stoop that low (unless I missed something sometime, which
I am sure others here will correct me on).

Greg Iverson

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The National Drug Research Institute has released some research on indigenous Australians and alcohol use:

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Alcohol causes the death of an Indigenous Australian every 38 hours on average, according to new research from the National Drug Research Institute (NDRI).

NDRI has found that the deaths of 1145 Indigenous Australians between 2000 and 2004 were caused by alcohol. The cause of death for more than half was alcoholic liver cirrhosis or suicide, and the average age of death from an alcohol-attributable cause was about 35.

The figures are contained in the National Alcohol Indicators Project (NAIP) Bulletin 11, Trends in alcohol-attributable deaths among Indigenous Australians, 1998-2004, released today.

Researchers say trends and numbers of alcohol-attributable deaths vary widely both between and within State borders, which means targeted region-specific approaches are needed to improve Indigenous health.

Bulletin co-author and NDRI Senior Research Fellow Dr Tanya Chikritzhs said this was the first NAIP bulletin to document numbers of alcohol-attributable harms among Indigenous Australians.

“This kind of information is important in planning our response to Indigenous health issues and in showing where resources should be directed for the maximum benefit,” Dr Chikritzhs said.

NDRI Indigenous Australian Research Team Leader Dennis Gray said the figures, which should be regarded as conservative estimates, showed Australia still had a long way to go to address the inequality between the health of Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians.

“If we are serious about addressing this disparity and reducing death rates among Indigenous Australians, we need to focus on the underlying social causes of that ill health,” Professor Gray said.

“For instance, suicide is the most frequent alcohol caused death among Indigenous men, which reflects the despair that many Indigenous people feel.”

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Indigenous Health is one of the core health issues in Australia and one that by any measure needs further work done, whether it be research, treatment or prevention. It’s also an area that might provide a way forward for opposing philosophical viewpoints on ATOD issues.

Specifically: a number of indigenous communities have requested that they become dry communities ( Click here for some Queensland examples) – this is an abstinence approach and also an approach that the community has to some extent agreed needs to occur.

The argument could be made that (within reason), a specific community’s needs in relation to ATOD becomes the driver for change. Would this then avoid some of the philosophical conflicts that impeded progress in some communities? The only downside I can see is in drawing the overall boundaries that a community would need to work within. Some indigenous communities have led the way in showing how successful change can be made – is it possible on a wider level?