Lambert’s tragic end is a sad echo of his mother’s. Best known for playing teenager Kimberly Drummond on “Diff’rent Strokes,” Plato struggled with drug and alcohol addiction, lost all her money, starred in semi-pornographic films, and was even arrested for armed robbery. In 1999, one day after being harassed by callers during an appearance on The Howard Stern Show, Plato overdosed on prescription drugs outside her mother’s house. She was 34 years old.

It’s not uncommon for suicides to occur more than once in the same family. If you know someone who might be at risk, visit the American Association of Suicidology website for help and resources.

Actress’s Son Ends Life After Struggling with Addiction, Depression is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

Reuters reports that a "critical health problem" is growing in places like Russia, China, Malaysia, and Thailand, they said, where drug users are a neglected population in the fight against AIDS and the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) that causes it.

Injecting drug use is an increasingly important cause of HIV transmission in many countries around the world. Users can spread the virus in blood by sharing needles with an HIV-infected person, and pass it on by having unprotected sex.

Of the estimated 16 million injecting drug users worldwide, 3 million are thought to be HIV-positive, and drug users are thought to account for 10 percent of all those living with HIV.

In Russia, for example, around a million injecting drug users are living with HIV and some 65 percent of new HIV infections there are thought to come from injections.

"Although the number of countries with core HIV prevention services is growing, the level of coverage in injecting drug users is poor in many countries," said Bradley Mathers of the University of New South Wales, Australia, who led a study on prevention efforts published in The Lancet medical journal.

Infection prevention steps like providing needles, condoms and substitute drugs like methadone — collectively known as "harm reduction" — are seen by many experts as key to halting the spread of HIV and AIDS, but some governments are reluctant to provide them for fear of being seen to condone drug use.

Gerry Stimson, director of the International Harm Reduction Association, accused such states of "playing politics with people’s lives" and said millions were at risk as a result.

UNAIDS estimates that around 30 percent of HIV transmission outside sub-Saharan Africa is driven by unsafe injecting practices. Stimson also pointed to Russia as a particular problem, saying injecting drug use in the region was now driving the fastest-growing HIV/AIDS epidemic in the world.

Mathers and his team of researchers looked at the provision of services to prevent HIV spread injecting drug users.

They found global coverage is very poor, but also varies widely. Worldwide, only 8 percent of injectors have accessed needle and syringe programs in the past year, but that ranges from an estimated 100 percent in Ireland and the Czech Republic to under 3 percent in China, Malaysia, and Thailand.

"HIV prevention treatment and care services for injecting drug users are clinically effective, but to exert a population-level effect they need to be delivered to scale," they wrote.

The current level is "not sufficient to prevent, halt or turn around the HIV epidemic among this at-risk population."

Don Des Jarlais of the Beth Israel Medical Center in New York said the poor coverage suggested some authorities should work to bring their policies "in line with scientific evidence."

"Long-term sustained efforts to protect the health of individuals who use both licit and illicit drugs might require that policy makers acquire a basic scientific understanding of drug use and addiction," he wrote.

Failure to Help Drug Users Leads to Spread of HIV is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

“You hear stories about you can’t get someone through the Internet,” said Maryland’s Howard County Sheriff’s Department deputy Matt Roberson. “Guess what??You can. I just did. Here you are, playing World of Warcraft, and you never know who you’re playing with.”

In this case, online gamers were playing alongside Alfred Hightower, a man wanted on charges of dealing in a schedule III controlled substance and dealing a schedule IV controlled substance, and two charges of dealing in marijuana. A warrant was issued for his arrest in 2007.

The sheriff’s department enlisted the aid of the U.S. Marshals this summer to track down a number of fugitives as part of Operation: Falcon, and Hightower was among those targeted. Unfortunately, authorities were unable to locate him. Roberson soon found out that he had left the country.

“I received information from a childhood friend, who tells me the guy is in Canada,” said Roberson. “I held onto the information in the back of my head. I spoke to the marshals and asked if we could confirm the guy’s location, would they help us get him? They indicated that they would.”

With the help of sheriff’s major Steve Rogers, Roberson began gathering information on Hightower through a number of sources, and discovered that their suspect was a World of Warcraft fan.

“We received information that this guy was a regular player of an online game, which was referred to as ‘some warlock and witches’ game,” said Roberson. “None of that information was sound enough to pursue on its own, but putting everything we had together gave me enough evidence to send a subpoena to Blizzard Entertainment. I knew exactly what he was playing—World of Warcraft. I used to play it. It’s one of the largest online games in the world.”

Roberson’s subpoena was nothing more than a politely worded request, considering the limits of his law enforcement jurisdiction and the ambiguity of the online world.

“They don’t have to respond to us, and I was under the assumption that they wouldn’t,” said Roberson. “It had been three or four months since I had sent the subpoena. I just put it in the back of my mind and went on to do other things. Then I finally got a response from them. They sent me a package of information. They were very cooperative. It was nice that they were that willing to provide information.”

Blizzard gave Roberson everything he needed to track down Hightower, including his IP address, his account information and history, his billing address, and even his online screen name and preferred server.

“I did a search off the IP?address to locate him,” said Roberson. “I got a longitude and latitude. Then I went to Google Earth. It works wonders. It uses longitude and latitude. Boom! I had an address. I was not able to go streetside at the location, but I had him.”

Roberson and Rogers contacted the U.S. Marshals, who immediately notified the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Canadian Border Services Agency. According to Rogers, Canadian authorities located Hightower in Ottawa, Ontario, and arranged to have him deported. The marshals picked up the suspect in Minneapolis, and Howard County has until Jan. 5 to bring him back here to face charges.

“Roberson did some great work on this deal,” said sheriff Marty Talbert. “This is the first time in my seven years as sheriff that a fugitive was located in Canada. Rogers and Roberson did an outstanding job coordinating this…Suspects cannot be allowed to escape facing criminal charges by simply moving and relocating.”

Man’s Video Game Addiction Gets Him Caught on Drug Charges is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

Science Daily reports that Jennifer L. Temple, PhD, a neurobiologist, assistant professor of exercise and nutrition sciences at the University at Buffalo, and director of its Nutrition and Health Research Laboratory, is looking for answers to these questions through a 4-year, $800,000 study funded by the National Institutes of Health.

Her paper addressing the first question appears in the December 2009 issue of Behavioural Pharmacology, and is considered the first study to show a gender effect in the appeal of caffeinated soda in young people.

Given the effects of caffeine in adults, the researchers expected to see a difference between those who habitually consumed a lot of soft drinks and those who consumed few. However, results showed that the difference was between boys and girls: The boys in the study worked harder and longer on a computer-based exercise to obtain caffeinated drinks.

Temple and colleagues have now completed the second part of the study a double-blind, placebo-controlled, dose-response study of the effects of caffeine on the teenagers’ blood pressure, heart rate and hand tremor. Two papers currently are being written reporting the results.

The third, and perhaps the most important question in the study, focusing on the effect of caffeine consumption during adolescence on later use of legal or illegal drugs, is getting underway.

Temple’s primary research interest is a behavior called food reinforcement. She became intrigued with caffeine consumption in children after conducting a small study in 8-12-year-olds.

“We had a lot of kids who were drinking not only soda, but coffee,” she relates. “I had 12-year-old girls who said that all they had that morning was a cup of coffee. I started thinking, ‘This can’t be good.’”

These findings led her to study how hard a person will work to obtain a particular food, or in this case, a caffeine drink—and how food reinforcement mimics drug addiction. She is trying to understand the mechanisms that underlie such reinforcement, and if it can be redirected to a more healthy habit.

The just-published study on the reinforcing value of caffeine involved 26 boys and 23 girls ages 12-17. The participants, who were not aware the study was testing caffeine’s reinforcement effects, were placed into groups based on their reported caffeine consumption, in any form.

Participants underwent a baseline test to determine if they could taste caffeine in the study drinks (they couldn’t), and a run-through to familiarize them with the computer-based program they would be using in the experiment.

To give participants experience with the study drinks, they were sent home with a week’s supply of test soda, randomized to be caffeinated or non-caffeinated, and were instructed to drink a 32-ounce bottle every day, for seven days, and no other soda or caffeinated products. During the second week, they obtained a week’s supply of the opposite drink.

Participants then returned to a laboratory equipped with two computers, one on which participants played a computer game to earn caffeinated drinks and on the other, non-caffeinated drinks, although the drinks’ caffeine status was blinded. The longer they played, the more difficult the game became.

Temple said the difference in the reinforcing potential of caffeine between males and females, but not between high and low consumers, was surprising. “These data are novel and they add to the small, but growing, body of literature on caffeine use in children and adolescents.”

She speculates these sex differences could be based on the effect of circulating hormones at the time of the test, although this was not measured, and the possibility that females are less sensitive to the effects of caffeine.

Alison M. Bulkley, Laura Briatico and Amber M. Dewey, all former or current undergraduate students in Temple’s lab, also contributed to the study.

Researchers Studying Addictive Effects of Caffeine on Young People is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

“It appears that about one-third of genetic influences on alcohol and marijuana use and dependence can be traced to the same set of genes,” said first author Carolyn E. Sartor, Ph.D. “Other genetic contributions are specific to alcohol or marijuana.”

The study results will be published in the March 2010 issue of the journal Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research, and they are available online through the journal’s Early View.

Jim Dryden of Washington University of St. Louis writes that Sartor, a research instructor in the Department of Psychiatry, said that with both alcohol and marijuana, the majority of genetic factors that contribute to use also contribute to the development of dependence symptoms.

She and her colleagues studied more than 6,200 Australian twins between the ages of 24 and 36. The twins were asked about the amount of alcohol and marijuana they had consumed over their lifetimes, their frequency of use, when they used the most, and questions that helped scientists determine whether the twins had symptoms of alcohol or marijuana dependence.

By studying twins, it’s possible to get a handle on the roles played by genetic and environmental factors involved in behaviors such as drinking alcohol or using marijuana. Identical twins share 100 percent of their genetic material, and fraternal twins share about half of their segregating genes. So when identical twin pairs are found to be more similar in a given behavior than fraternal twin pairs, it’s likely genes are playing a significant role. The researchers used the twin model to estimate the contributions of genes and environment in alcohol and marijuana use and dependence.

They classified alcohol users according to how much they drank. Those who were heavier users of alcohol were more likely to use marijuana, too. The survey found that almost everyone drank alcohol, at least occasionally.

Marijuana is the most commonly used illicit drug in the United States. Roughly 8 to 12 percent of marijuana users are considered dependent and, as with alcohol, the severity of their symptoms increases with heavier use.

“In a 2008 survey of high-school students in the United States, 41.8 percent of 12th graders reported having used marijuana,” Sartor said. “Most had used the drug on just a few occasions, but more than 5 percent reported using it daily in the month preceding the survey.”
Heavy marijuana or alcohol use is closely linked to dependence. Not long ago, many believed marijuana was not an addictive substance like alcohol or nicotine, but Sartor said that’s incorrect.

“There is a myth that cannabis is harmless, and although there is plenty of recreational use of the drug that does not lead to problems, like any other drug, you can misuse it to the point that it interferes with day-to-day functioning,” she explained. “For about 10 percent of the people who ever try marijuana, that’s what happens.”

Although studies involving genetic contributions to alcohol dependence have been ongoing for close to 30 years, similar studies involving marijuana have emerged much more recently. Sartor believes ultimately environmental factors linked to alcohol and marijuana use may be key to effective therapies for abuse and dependence.

“Interestingly, the environmental influences on use and dependence did not appear to be the same for alcohol as for marijuana,” Sartor said. “The overlap in genetic influences on marijuana-dependence symptoms and alcohol-dependence symptoms tells us that individuals with family histories of alcohol-related problems are at increased risk for developing problem marijuana use and that a family history of marijuana-related problems is an indicator of elevated risk for alcohol misuse.”

“But when we talk about prevention and treatment—since it’s the environmental components rather than the genetics that we can manipulate—we may need to focus on those substance-specific environmental influences to help people avoid becoming dependent on alcohol or marijuana,” she continued.

Common Genetic Factors Contribute to Alcohol and Marijuana Use and Dependence is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

No One Starts Out Trying to Abuse Drugs

Unless someone is deliberately suicidal, they generally don’t start out trying to abuse drugs. Drug abuse, dependence and addiction occur over time. And, no, it isn’t just illegal drugs that cause addiction. Millions of Americans are addicted to one or more prescription drugs. What typically happens is you have some medical problem and you go to your doctor to find out what it is and what can be done about it. Let’s say you fall and hurt your low back. This is common enough and certainly something we can all relate to. The doctor asks some questions such as how long you’ve had the condition, what brought it on, where the pain hurts, when does it hurt most, what type of pain is it, and other questions. He then performs a physical examination and orders X-rays. Since you’re in pain, he gives you a prescription for a painkiller, an opiate.

Opiates are narcotics, and because they have a high potential for addiction, they are generally prescribed for only 1 to 2 weeks. Depending on the level of pain, your doctor may prescribe varying strengths of opiate. Some of the more common are:

• Codeine (Tylenol-3)
• Fentanyl (Actiq)
• Hydrocodone (Vicodin, Lortab, Norco, Panlor)
• Methadone (Dolophine, Methadose)
• Morphine (MS Contin, Oramorph SR, Avinza)
• Oxycodone (OxyContin, Percocet, Percodan, Percolone)
• Propoxyphene (Darvocet-N)

You take the medication for the prescribed period, but find that you still have pain. You may go back to the same doctor or see another one and repeat the same procedure. What you’re looking for is a new prescription for another painkiller. The problem with this is that you are contributing to your own addiction.

According to WebMD, opiates are not intended to be taken until all the pain goes away. Their intended use is just to get patients through the most severe pain. By continuing to take opiates, you risk dependence and addiction. Long-term abuse of opiates leads to potentially severe withdrawal symptoms when you suddenly stop taking them.

What happens after you’ve been taking opiates, or some other prescription drug with a high potential for addiction, and you realize you’re hooked? You certainly didn’t want to become dependent on the drug, but once you are, you’re in for a difficult time getting off your dependence.

One Plus More Doesn’t Mean Better

If you have a nagging pain that sometimes becomes acute and you have a prescription from your doctor in the medicine cabinet, it’s tempting to pop more than one pill to make the pain go away faster. At least, that’s what you tell yourself. The truth is, however, that taking more than the recommended dose does not make it better. In fact, it could lead to complications that may be uncomfortable, dangerous, or potentially life threatening.

Watch Out for Drug Interactions
Many Americans, especially the elderly, take multiple prescription medications on a daily basis. It’s not uncommon for a diabetic woman in her 80s, who also suffers from heart disease, high blood pressure and early Alzheimer’s, to be taking insulin, a blood thinner, blood pressure medication and several more medications. Recent studies show that the average person over 65 takes between two and seven prescription medications daily.

Some people who regularly take numerous medications have a system to ensure they take their pills in the right order and at the right time. This may be a pill container with pills portioned out for each day, or pill bottles lined up on the kitchen counter in the order they are to be taken, bottles numbered in sequence, ribbons tied around some, markings made with multi-colored felt tip pens on others. In short, it’s a mixed bag. The trouble is, mistakes happen all the time.

Grandma forgets that she already took her heart medicine this morning, so she takes it again, along with her lunch and a few more medications she usually takes at that time. Grandpa complains that somebody stole his medication because he knows he didn’t take it and the pills don’t add up right. He takes his medicine a second time. Both of these examples illustrate what can happen with the elderly due to forgetfulness, confusion, difficulty concentrating or other problems associated with aging.

The risk for drug interactions, along with food/drug interactions and side effects, increases with such mistakes. Some medications, when taken out of sequence or in combination with other medications, may not work or may result in dangerous side effects. It’s an unfortunate fact that most adverse drug reactions reported each year involve people older than 60.

Never Mix Drugs and Alcohol

This should be a no-brainer, but it isn’t. Despite printed warnings on prescription labels, warnings on TV advertisements for medications, numerous newspaper, TV and Internet stories about the dangers of mixing drugs and alcohol, people still do it.

According to Harmful Interactions: Mixing Alcohol with Medicines, a publication from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), mixing alcohol with medications puts you at risk for dangerous reactions. Here are just a few of the many conditions for which medications are commonly prescribed and the interactions of those drugs with alcohol.

• Allergies/colds/flu – drowsiness, dizziness, increased risk for overdose
• Angina (chest pain), coronary heart disease – rapid heartbeat, sudden changes in blood pressure, dizziness, fainting
• Blood clots – occasional drinking may lead to internal bleeding; heavier drinking may cause bleeding or have the opposite effect, resulting in blood clots, strokes or heart attacks
• Diabetes – abnormally low blood sugar levels, nausea, vomiting, headache, rapid heartbeat, sudden changes in blood pressure
• High blood pressure – dizziness, drowsiness, fainting, heart problems (such as arrhythmia, changes in the heart’s regular heartbeat
• Muscle pain – drowsiness, dizziness, increased risk of seizures, increased risk for overdose, memory problems, impaired motor control, slowed or difficulty breathing

Know who is taking what

How many individuals are in your household? How many of them are regularly taking prescription medications? Who dispenses the medication? Do you rely on the individual to self dispense, or do you make it a practice to remind them or put the medicine out for them to take?

The reason these questions are important is that it is so easy to lose track of who’s taking what and for what condition. Without some system of oversight, there are bound to be dosing errors, medication not taken at the proper times or at all, or medicines taken together that shouldn’t be. Someone has to take responsibility for this. Who is it in your house?

If there are only two adults, say a husband and wife, you’d think that each person should be able to handle their own medication schedule. That’s true to a point. But what often happens is that one person is usually the one to order and pick up prescription refills so that ongoing prescriptions don’t run out. The other person, who may be taking the medication, just follows his or her daily routine of taking it. It would be logical for the one who orders the medications to somehow keep tabs on all the medications in the household. In other words, institute a tracking system for who’s taking what.

Take an inventory, marking what medications are for what condition, how often the medicine is to be taken, who takes it, when it should be taken, and anything else pertinent. Once this is in place, it becomes easier to notice gaps, or something out of the ordinary.

Knowing what medications your loved one is taking will also help you to be able to quickly spot a potential drug interaction – with another drug and/or food. And, if some new medications are introduced, keep a close eye for any indications of side effects.

Mind Expiration Dates

Never permit outdated medications to remain in the medicine cabinet or anywhere else. While some medications may be effective for some period of time after their expiration date, it’s not a good idea to take the chance. This is especially true for life-saving medicines for heart conditions, diabetes, and other conditions.

Go through the house today and toss out all expired medications. If some of these are still necessary, contact your doctor to get a new prescription. Write the expiration date of the newly-obtained medication on the tracking list along with other pertinent information.

Ensure Safety Precautions

While we’re on the subject of inventory and expiration dates, here’s another important tip. If you have young children or teenagers in the house, or if your elderly parents or other relatives live with you, take appropriate safety precautions for all medications. Keep them locked up in a medicine cabinet.

Does this sound extreme? You may be surprised to know that teenagers say the easiest way to obtain prescription medications – that they take for non-medical purposes – is to simply raid their parents’ medicine cabinet or one at the home of their friends. Eager to experiment, test the bounds, fit in with the crowd, and take risks, adolescents and teens gravitate toward this “open candy store” pharmacopeia. Alcohol is often involved and the results can be catastrophic. Mixing prescription drugs used for non-medical purposes with alcohol can lead to impaired driving, overdose, seizures, increased heartbeat, increased blood pressure, stroke, unconsciousness, coma and death.

Ask for Pharmacist Consult

Whenever you get a new prescription, ask for a consult with the pharmacist. Inquire what potential side effects this new drug has, and how it may interact with other medication you or someone else you’re getting the prescription for takes. Of course, the best practice is to have all your prescription drugs filled at the same pharmacy. If you do most of your ongoing prescriptions through a mail-order pharmacy, contact their customer service department and speak with a pharmacist to ask the appropriate questions.

End Date

Surely none of us wants to go on taking medication forever. Even if we have an ongoing condition, the possibility exists that the doctor can reduce the strength or frequency of a prescription. He or she may even recommend we stop taking it at a certain point.

Make it a practice to ask your doctor how long you’ll need to take this medication. Bring in your list of medicines that you currently take and go through each one with the doctor. This is especially important if you’ve obtained prescriptions at other doctors. Your primary doctor should advise you on the protocol for keeping, reducing, changing or quitting medications. This may be done in consult with the original prescribing doctor.

Take Charge of your Health

There’s no better way to keep on top of what to expect than to be proactive. It’s up to you to become knowledgeable about the medicines you take, how they may affect you, how they can interact with other prescriptions, over-the-counter drugs, food and/or alcohol. It’s also important that you know your body and be alert to signs that something’s wrong.

Don’t just take medication like it’s a vitamin. Medicines are very powerful. They can, in some instances, and when taken correctly, mean the difference between life and death. When taken without regard for the dangers, or abused and taken to the point of dependence and addiction, they can also mean the difference between life and death – in this case, unintended.

Know that addiction to prescription drugs can easily sneak up on you if you’re not paying attention to the signs. Take as little medication as you need for the shortest period of time. If you find that you do get into trouble, feeling a dependence on the prescription drug, seek medical attention and counseling.

Bottom line: be smart about prescription addiction. The life you save may be your own (or that of your loved one).

Be Smart About Prescription Addiction: What You Don’t Know May Kill You is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

Although qat is overwhelmingly accepted as the country’s drug of choice, Abdul Aziz, manager of the Black and Brown Café in Sana’a, says his establishment doesn’t allow qat on the premises. “This restaurant’s no qat. We try to help people to go out from the bad habit,” Aziz told Kenyon. “I would like to see our people little bit happy. I mean, the Yemenis. For that reason, I try to help my country.”

Kenyon said that Yemen’s water and environment minister, Abdul Rahman al-Eryani, says qat is one of several causes of a water crisis that could see Sana’a become the first world capital to run out of water in the coming years. He says qat uses half the irrigation water in the country, and irrigation claims more than 85 percent of the total water supply.

“If the government is really serious about it, they should start doing this: stop subsidies for qat, that qat is like any other drug,” said Eryani. “We need a long-term program of awareness and then we have to deal with reducing the demand. I don’t believe that you can fight something like this by issuing decrees or saying don’t grow qat. As long as there is demand, people will grow qat.”

In the Haraz Moutains, east of the capital, local leaders have made a deal with farmers: if they rip out their qat plants and replace them with coffee beans, they’ll be guaranteed no loss of income while they make the transition, which could take several years. Kenyon said that this addresses a key problem because qat is an immediate and reliable cash crop for farmers, unlike other foods that take longer to grow and are vulnerable to the changing economy.

Kenyon said Black and Brown Café manager Aziz hopes the idea of qat-free public places will catch on with younger people who may not yet be addicted to the chewing leaf.

“I want to change the mentality of the businessmen in Yemen, because when they will see there is a people, there is a young generation, they like and they’re ready to spend some money here and have the (unintelligible) that’s good for the country. I will be happy if they will see that,” he said.

But a retired pilot sitting nearby shook his head and said he doubts he will live to see the day when Yemenis treat qat as part of their problems instead of a temporary solution.

Yemen’s Addiction to Chewing Leaf Qat is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

Goldstein and fellow musician Travis Barker were the sole survivors of the Learjet crash in South Carolina in September 2008, but they both spent months receiving treatment for burns, trauma, and emotional distress.

Now Goldstein’s estate is suing the company that chartered the plane for wrongful death, claiming that Goldstein, a former drug addict, was forced to take various pain medications as a result of the accident, which left two pilots and two friends dead.

The family lawyers are also going after Learjet and the estates of the two dead pilots, according to TMZ.com.

Family Says Plane Crash Caused DJ AM’s Death is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

"Drugs and alcohol abuse can happen to anyone whether you’re famous or not," said Montine Pauer, Student Assistant Program (SAP) Coordinator and Counselor for the University Health & Counseling Services. "This is important. We [were] looking for people to tell their stories, from faculty, staff, and students, to get an interesting mix of how drugs and alcohol touched their life.”

During the week of October 5th, SAP hosted events to celebrate the National Collegiate Alcohol Awareness Week, which is usually honored during the week of October 18th to 24th. Pauer planned the awareness week early to accommodate for the Homecoming events set for the following week. "I wanted to get [the students] before they made bad decisions and [went] out (to) drink," Pauer said.

During the laid-back discussion, Farley said the drinking culture in Wisconsin has a great impact on the number of reported drunk drivers that are on the road. In an impromptu section of the discussion, six volunteers participated in an activity to resolve an issue by contributing one sentence beginning with a different letter of the alphabet.

"The exercise makes people think about the different solutions you can come up with to resolve an issue," Farley said.

The scenario presented was what to do when a friend becomes too intoxicated and passes out while a group is hanging out in a friend’s basement. Some of the solutions included finding an adult, banging pots and pans to wake him up, and calling 911.

Farley is an advocate for drug and alcohol awareness due to the impact his brother’s death had on him and his family. He wrote of his struggles with his brother’s addiction in his book, "The Chris Farley Show: A Biography in Three Acts.”

Chris Farley’s Brother Speaks about Substance Abuse at University is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment

“Based on primary substance abuse treatment admission data from the Iowa Department of Public Health, alcohol accounts for about 61 percent of all clients, followed by 23 percent who are there primarily for marijuana and almost 8percent mainly for meth,” said Gary Kendell, Iowa’s Drug Policy Coordinator and Director of the Governor’s Office of Drug Control Policy. “All available evidence indicates more Iowans are abusing prescription and over-the-counter drugs too.”

Kendell presented Iowa’s new drug control strategy Monday to White House Office of National Drug Control Policy Director Gil Kerlikowske during a discussion with officials at the Iowa Capitol in Des Moines. Kerlikowske was in Iowa to gather input for the Obama Administration’s first National Drug Control Strategy, due to be released early next year.

“Coordination at all levels and across borders is required to reduce drug abuse and related issues such as crime, and I’m pleased Director Kerlikowske has come to Iowa to listen as state and local officials share experiences that may relate to the national drug control plan,” said Kendell.

Iowa’s strategy, developed in coordination with the State’s Drug Policy Advisory Council, calls for a balance of substance abuse prevention and treatment programming, as well as drug enforcement.

Prescription drug abuse continues to emerge as Iowa’s fastest growing form of substance abuse. The Iowa Division of Narcotics Enforcement opened 243 percent more pharmaceutical cases and seized 412 percent more pharmaceutical units last year, compared with the previous year. Another indicator of the growth in medicine abuse is the 1,225 percent increase since 2002 in public calls to the Statewide Poison Control Center to identify hydrocodone and oxycodone pain pills.

In response to these developments, the Governor’s Office of Drug Control Policy recently launched Iowa’s first statewide prescription and over-the-counter drug abuse awareness campaign, featuring the new website www.TakeADoseOfTruth.com.

After trending downward over the last five years, methamphetamine use in Iowa has increased again. The resurgence is reflected in small increases in meth-related treatment admission rates, cases of manufacturing meth in the presence of a minor, and, for the second straight year, the existence of meth labs.

Implementation of an electronic pseudoephedrine sales tracking database is slated for early next year to further curb meth labs. Due largely to the drop in meth labs since 2004, drug-related prison admissions were down for the fifth year in a row last year.

Marijuana potency has generally increased in Iowa in recent years, according to law enforcement officials. And while the Iowa Department of Public Health reports that marijuana was the primary substance of abuse for more than 23 percent of all treatment clients last year, it was cited as the drug of choice by almost 56 percent of juvenile substance abuse clients during that same period.

Alcohol consumption in Iowa, based on sales, increased for the eighth straight year in State Fiscal 2009 to 2.1 gallons of absolute alcohol sales per capita, according to Iowa’s Alcoholic Beverages Division. That’s a nearly 50 percent increase in alcohol sales/consumption over the last decade, representing the highest level in recent history, and coinciding with 61 percent of treatment clients citing alcohol as their primary substance of abuse.

“The good news is that almost all categories of substance abuse by Iowa youth continue to decline, and we have the nation’s lowest rate of illicit drug use by youth according to recent state and national surveys,” said Kendell.

“Substance abuse prevention and treatment programs, and law enforcement initiatives are working relatively well among some segments of the population, but considerable work remains to keep Iowans from starting to use drugs and to get those who’ve started to stop.”

The report includes the following recommendations by Iowa’s Drug Policy Coordinator:

• Regulate Salvia divinorum by making it a Schedule 1 Controlled Substance, to protect Iowans from the potentially intense and debilitating effects of this hallucinogenic herb.

• Require utilization of Iowa’s Prescription Monitoring Program by all prescribers (physicians, etc.) and pharmacists, and increase law enforcement access to the database to improve patient care and citizen safety.

• Require full substance abuse and mental health parity to increase access to treatment, reduce crime, and retain workers in Iowa.

• Require substance abuse prevention education as part of the Iowa Core Curriculum to enhance student health and prevent unsafe behavior.

• Resist efforts to legalize the smoking of marijuana for medical or other purposes, based on the consensus of science and other medical evidence.

• Enhance community-based corrections supervision of offenders, including drug testing, to improve offender rehabilitation and accountability in a cost-efficient manner.

• Continue enhancing and implementing a comprehensive plan to reduce underage and binge drinking, including possible policy changes and environmental prevention strategies.

Marijuana and Meth are the Most Abused Illicit Drugs in Iowa is a post from: Drug Addiction Treatment