www.alkoholpolitik.ch

National efforts to curb substance abuse in Canada are seeing a return on investment, according to a recent report, Marketwire reported Oct. 12. The report was prepared by the Canadian Centre on Substance Abuse (CCSA), the only nongovernmental agency in the country with a legislative mandate to reduce alcohol- and other drug-related harm. The CCSA receives a significant amount of public funding through Health Canada. (Source: Join Together, 10/14/10)

…Urges The American Academy Of Pediatrics
The monumental task of persuading children and adolescents to say „No“ to drugs, alcohol and tobacco is being constantly undermined by the $25 billions‘ worth of advertising and marketing each year, which has precisely the opposite effect, says the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP).
A new AAP policy statement – „Children, Adolescents, Substance Abuse and the Media“ – appears in the latest issue of the peer reviewed medical journal Pediatrics. The policy statement calls for a total ban on all tobacco advertising, restrictions on the advertising of alcoholic drinks, and a ban on erectile dysfunction drug ads before 10pm. (Source: Medical News Today, 9/27/10)

2010 FAMILY DINNERS REPORT FINDS:
MORE THAN 70 PERCENT OF TEENS THINK THAT EATING FREQUENT FAMILY DINNERS IS IMPORTANT
NEW YORK, NY, September 22, 2010 – Compared to teens who have frequent family dinners (five to seven per week), those who have infrequent family dinners (fewer than three per week) are more than twice as likely to say that they expect to try drugs in the future, according to The Importance of Family Dinners VI, a new report from The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA*) at Columbia University.
The CASA family dinners report reveals that nearly three-quarters (72 percent) of teens think that eating dinner frequently with their parents is very or fairly important. Compared to teens who have frequent family dinners, those who have infrequent family dinners are:
* Twice as likely to have used tobacco;
* Almost twice as likely to have used alcohol; and
* One and half times likelier to have used marijuana. (Source: The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University, 9/22/10)

Michigan’s Liquor Control Commission will scrutinize the labels and packaging of alcoholic energy drinks, the Associated Press reported Sept. 18. The regulatory agency is concerned about the health effects of the drinks, and whether they are inappropriately marketed to minors.
„We believe that these products sometimes are misleading people,” said commission chairwoman Nida Samona. The commission will require that companies change the labels or packaging of drinks if regulators believe they do not accurately represent the amount and percentage of alcohol and caffeine they contain.
Companies will have 90 days to make changes. „If they don’t comply, it comes off the shelves,“ Samona said. (Source: Join Together, 9/21/10)

Millions of Americans suffer from severe addictions that can ruin lives and are extremely difficult to control. Nearly 2 million enter roughly 12,000 addiction treatment programs in the U.S. each year. And each month, some 15,000 people turn to Adi Jaffe’s All About Addiction websites and at Psychology Today, which provide information, the latest research and answers to readers‘ questions. (Source: Medical News Today, 9/10/10)

Several World Health Organisation reports over recent years have highlighted the high incidence of chronic diseases such as diabetes, coronary heart disease and cancer. Contributory factors include unhealthy diets, alcohol and tobacco use and sedentary lifestyles. This paper reports the findings of a review of reviews of behavioural change interventions to reduce unhealthy behaviours or promote healthy behaviours. We included six different health-related behaviours in the review: healthy eating, physical exercise, smoking, alcohol misuse, sexual risk taking (in young people) and illicit drug use. We excluded reviews which focussed on pharmacological treatments or those which required intensive treatments (e.g. for drug or alcohol dependency). (Source: BMC Public Health, 9/08/10)

The majority of U.S. emergency-room (ER) visits for underage drinking involve males, according to a new report from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA).
HealthDay reported Aug. 11 that researchers in SAMHSA’s public health surveillance system analyzed 2008 data and found that one-third of drug-related ER visits among patients aged 12-20 involved alcohol. Of these, males accounted for 53 percent of patients aged 12-17 and 62 percent of patients aged 18-20. (Source: Join Together, 8/19/10)

Twenty-seven percent of public school students ages 12 to 17 say that their school is both gang- and drug-infected (drugs are used, kept or sold on school grounds), according to the National Survey of American Attitudes on Substance Abuse XV: Teens and Parents, the 15th annual back-to-school survey conducted by The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA*) at Columbia University. This means that 5.7 million public school students attend schools which are both gang- and drug-infected. (Source: casacolumbia.org, 8/19/10)

If actress/starlet/addict Lindsay Lohan accomplishes nothing else in this life — and this seems increasingly probable — we’ll at least be able to say that she has sparked a conversation about the relative merits of drug treatment versus incarceration.
As you may know, Lohan used up even the long rope afforded repeat offenders in Hollywood and was sent to jail in July for violating the terms of her probation stemming from a drunk-driving conviction. Lohan’s teary courtroom appearances have elicited some sympathy. …(Source: Join Together, 8/16/10)

According to a Lancet Comment, „alcohol remains conspicuously absent from the larger field of research and programming in HIV and substance use. … Patterns of hazardous alcohol consumption prevail in countries with the most severe HIV epidemics, notably eastern and southern Africa.“ In addition, „hazardous drinking patterns also dominate in the concentrated epidemics of eastern Europe and Asia, where alcohol use by injecting drug users and other marginalised groups might be an additional barrier to effective efforts to prevent HIV infection.“ The comment notes that both men and women are harmed by excessive alcohol use and calls for more research „focused on reducing alcohol-related sexual-risk behaviour, [which] might offer valuable lessons for the wider field of HIV and substance-use research“ (Fritz et. al, 8/7). (Source: Medical News Today, 8/09/10) our Online-Comment: „Conspicuously“ is the correct wording in this connection. Alcohol is
„tabu“ regarding HIV, poverty, developing aid and sexual-risk behaviour. Public health authorities and politicians are afraid they would have to fight for less alcohol consumption.