We curate a digest of the latest news in our field for advocates, policymakers, community coalitions and all who work toward shaping policies and practices to effectively prevent substance use and treat addiction.
Some states may say that marijuana is medicine, but the VA is having none of that: doctors affiliated with the federal veteran’s health program have been barred from recommending medical marijuana to patients ... Meeting with the enemy: the head of the FDA’s new tobacco-regulation agency spoke this week at a conference of Big Tobacco execs ...
The Rhode Island Closing the Addiction Treatment Gap initiative released its report this morning. They asked me to speak at the event. That got me thinking. Why do we have this enormous gap? Why is such a complicated but treatable brain/behavioral disease treated mostly in a separate and unequal system where care is provided almost entirely without physicians by individuals with relatively modest formal training?
Screening, Brief Intervention and Referral to Treatment (SBIRT) programs are hot right now -- there’s an impressive research base showing they work to cut costs and can nip addiction in the bud. SBIRT also stars in the Obama administration’s new National Drug Control Strategy.
But what about the human side of this somewhat nebulous protocol?
Higher prices and restrictions on advertising will help prevent excessive drinking, World Health Organization says in new policy resolution (too bad it’s non-binding) ? How do you reconcile ’drug-free schools’ with medical-marijuana laws? That’s what school districts in Colorado are trying to figure out ?
The Obama administration’s 2011 budget calls for flat funding of the $1.79-billion Substance Abuse Prevention and Treatment (SAPT) block grant, but advocates are appealing to Congress to boost funding for the formula grant to states by $210 million.
’Hey, Friend -- have you tried the new vodka in the skull bottle?’: New report says the alcohol industry is engaged in ’stealth’ marketing to youth on social-networking sites online ... Oh, about that vodka: Yes, there really is a brand of vodka being sold in a bottle shaped like a crystal skull. It just got banned in Ontario ...