Education programs and intervention efforts aimed at teenagers often seek to eliminate immediate consequences by helping them make responsible choices about alcohol and drugs. One of the many areas requiring attention is keeping kids from immediate dangers, such as driving while intoxicated.
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Forensic pathologists have shown that over three percent of all sudden deaths in southwest Spain are related to the use of cocaine. They believe their findings can be extrapolated to much of the rest of Europe, indicating that cocaine use is a growing public health problem in Europe and that there is no such thing as “safe” recreational use of small amounts of the drug.
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An artificial intelligence that can automatically plan and execute experiments may soon provide new insights into the biology of addiction to drugs and alcohol. The artificial intelligence (AI) that controls the experiments, called “Eureqa,” could help detect disease organisms or traces of toxic chemicals, said Hod Lipson, associate professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering and computing and information science.
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New findings suggest that a kind of protein could help cocaine addicts beat their addiction. The protein, known as cocaine esterase, is a naturally occurring bacterial enzyme that breaks down cocaine. This is thought to make cocaine less addictive, but it doesn’t last long in the body.
According to a new study, the type of alcohol consumed effects the severity of the following day’s hangover. To better understand the effects of alcohol, specifically the levels of toxic substances called congeners in the alcohol, researchers at the Brown University Center for Alcohol and Addiction Studies in Providence, Rhode Island, and the University of Michigan Medical School recruited 95 healthy heavy drinkers, 58 men and 37 women, between the ages of 21 and 33 residing in the greater Boston area. Prior to the study, none of the participants had ever been treated for alcohol-related problems, and none had experienced any form of sleep disorders.
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An Emory University study has found that daily marijuana use in adolescence may hasten the onset of symptoms leading up to psychosis. Science Daily reports that the study was published in the November issue of the American Journal of Psychiatry.
New research shows that thrill-seeking teenagers are especially susceptible to fruit-flavored cigarettes, coinciding with the recent ban on the sale of flavored cigarettes by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). According to the FDA, the September 2009 ban, authorized by the new Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, is part of a national effort by the FDA to reduce smoking, which is the leading preventable cause of death in America.
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Regular consumers of cannabis and alcohol are more impulsive than non-users, according to a study by psychologists from the University of Almeria in Spain, led by Dr. Pilar Flores and Flor Zaldívar.
However, there is no evidence of the differences between both of these consumer groups, which makes these experts believe that “consuming these substances, whatever their nature, is related to impulsivity.”
Science Daily reports that this study, which began in October 2006, was promoted by the Department for Equal Opportunities and Social Welfare.
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Smoking tobacco through a waterpipe exposes the user to the same toxicants (carbon monoxide and nicotine) as smoking a cigarette, which could lead to nicotine addiction and heart disease, according to a study led by a Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) researcher published in the December issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.
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Drug users are well informed about the harms associated with the drugs they use, and they perceive alcohol and tobacco to be amongst the most dangerous substances, according to a survey by researchers from University College London (UCL) and Imperial College London. The findings, published in the Journal of Psychopharmacology, suggest that the current system of classifying psychoactive drugs in the UK may need to be revisited.
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