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December 2014 |
drinkanddrugsnews
| 25
Review of the year |
2014 in focus
www.drinkanddrugsnews.com
SEPTEMBER
In contrast to last month’s
encouraging news from Scotland, a
sharp rise in drug deaths in England
sparks alarm in the field, with
DrugScope expressing ‘serious
concerns’. The CQC sets out its new
approach to inspecting drug and
alcohol services and promises the
sector that it will ‘focus on the issues
that matter’, while the annual UK
recovery walk hits number six in
Manchester.
OCTOBER
The Home Office’s study of
international drug polices finds ‘no
apparent correlation’ between the
toughness of a country’s approach and
levels of use, setting off a media
frenzy, and crime prevention minister
Norman Baker accuses the
government of ‘suppressing’ the
document, which has been ready for
months. Less than a week later he
resigns, stating that working with
home secretary Theresa May was like
‘walking through mud’.
NOVEMBER
Fewer than half of those infected with
hepatitis C know they have the virus,
warns PHE, with around 90 per cent of
the 13,750 hepatitis C infections
diagnosed in the UK in 2013 acquired
through injecting drug use, while the
ACMD rejects the concept of time-
limited substitution treatment.
‘There’s still an appetite in bits of
government to re-ask the question
about time-limited methadone, but
the evidence remains the evidence,’ ex-
NTA chief Paul Hayes tells
DDN
. Right
on cue, Iain Duncan Smith pens a
Sunday Telegraph
piece under the
headline
Now fight the methadone
industry that keeps addicts hooked
.
Finally,
DDN
celebrates its tenth
birthday with a special anniversary
issue. ‘I thought they’d taken leave of
their senses,’ writes ex-FDAP chief
Simon Shepherd of the time DDN’s
publishers told him they’d quit their
jobs to set up the magazine.
DECEMBER
As
DDN
looks to its 11th year,
preparations are well underway for the
next service user involvement
conference,
The challenge: getting it
right for everybody
, in Birmingham
next February. See you there!
MEDIASAVVY
WHO’S BEEN SAYING WHAT..?
Parliament’s response to this week’s report on the 1971 Misuse of Drugs Act
shows that psychoactive substances are the last taboo to afflict Britain’s elite.
It has got over past obsessions with whipping, hanging, sodomy and abortion,
but it is still stuck on drugs. There is no point in reading the latest research on
drugs policy worldwide. It is spitting in the wind. The only research worth
doing is on why drugs policy reduces British politicians to gibbering wrecks.
Simon Jenkins,
Guardian
, 1 November
My blood boils when I hear loony liberal politicians (I’m thinking Nick Clegg)
and middle class do-gooders telling us that ALL drugs should be legalised…
Don’t these lettuce-munching liberals realise millions of mums and dads all
over Britain are fighting tooth and nail to keep their kids away from drugs?
Carole Malone,
Mirror
, 1 November
The Lib Dems knew there was no hope of the Conservatives agreeing to
change the law on drugs. They are so sure of this that they have not even
bothered to work out whether they want to decriminalise or legalise
cannabis. They are happy simply to pose as the party of opposition that they
used to be, repeating old soundbites about ‘losing the war on drugs’. Nick
Clegg knows that there is a market for this comforting rhetoric among a
minority of the electorate, and he knows that this minority is larger than the
8 per cent of voters currently intending to vote Lib Dem.
John Rentoul,
Independent
, 4 November
The special loathing I encounter for telling the truth about drugs is so
virulent that it sometimes comes close to frightening me. This is an
enormous campaign for selfish pleasure. If it succeeds in achieving the
legalisation it dreams of, and which is the real aim of this relentless
lobbying, there are gigantic profits to be made and huge taxes to be raised.
Peter Hitchens,
Mail on Sunday
, 2 November
The culture of prescribing methadone has proved incredibly stubborn and
difficult to break. There is still a huge amount more that government must
do, so that in practice treatment is about full recovery instead of
maintenance… This approach requires that we fight vested interests and
challenge the status quo.
Iain Duncan Smith,
Sunday Telegraph
, 16 November
Russell Brand is a classic dry drunk. He has that hyperactivity that
characterises many of those who, having once relied on drink or drugs, find
themselves restlessly sober, trying to fill that gap by furious over-production
as a way of absorbing their new-found energy... In
Revolution
, he not only
testifies to his belief in God and ‘the power of people to manifest, here on
earth, a society that represents holy principles’, he actually puts forward the
AA’s own ‘Twelve Traditions’ as his best model for society at large. It’s worked
for him and so he ordains the same for everyone.
David Sexton,
London Evening Standard
, 4 November
Pregnant women with a drinking problem – like anyone with a drinking
problem – need support rather than censure. Anyone who has the welfare of
the child at heart, rather than the punitive desire to teach someone a lesson,
can surely see that.
Joanna Moorehead,
Guardian
, 5 November