This research study provides estimates of the economic and social costs of Class A drug use in England and Wales for the year 2000. The methodology used to estimate costs will also enable future simulations of the relationship between various streams of government proactive and reactive expenditure.
This article provides some background information on drugs and drug usage in Portugal and trace the development of the changes in Portuguese drug policy and what the anticipated results of the changes will be.
This article argues that safe injection facilities could serve a purposeful and complementary role in our continuum of services, and therefore a rigorous trial and evaluation of safe injection facilities is warranted.
The authors in this article propose a model of safe injection rooms that could be operate on a 24-hour basis every day to provide adequate services whenever needed and prevent risks of overdose. The staff would also be able to refer clients to detox, treatment, counselling and primary health care.
TNI Drugs & Conflict Debate Paper 4, March 2002 - Alternative Development programmes aim at encouraging peasants to switch from growing illicit drugs-related crops.
Patients are frequently found carrying illicit drugs in the gastrointestinal tract in hospitals sited close to international airports. Drugs, usually heroin or cocaine, are wrapped in cellophane packets or condoms. Packages are concealed by being swallowed or passed into the rectum. Conservative treatment is appropriate providing bowel osbstruction or package perforation has not occurred.
The present study estimated the associations among three groups of drug users (chronic drug users, injecting drug users and non-drug users) and three types of health services utilisation (emergency room use, outpatient care and inpatient care).
A principal, perhaps dominant, motivation for this research is that it can inform policy and lead to reductions in the nation's drug problems. It is unclear that the existing work, summarized in the first half of this chapter, does so; the second half of the chapter describes how a more policy-relevant research agenda might be developed.