Articles

Brief report: the association between recreational versus therapeutic marijuana use on hazardous alcohol consumption and alcohol-associated behavioral consequences among adults living with HIV in Florida

Though marijuana use has previously been associated with risky alcohol use, studies often do not delineate between the effect of recreational versus therapeutic marijuana use, particularly among people living ...

Authors: Zachary L. Mannes, Erin G. Ferguson, Larry E. Burrell, Robert L. Cook and Nicole Ennis

The complex relation between access to opioid agonist therapy and diversion of opioid medications: a case example of large-scale misuse of buprenorphine in the Czech Republic

Opioid agonist therapy (OAT) has been available in a standard regime in the Czech Republic since 2000. Buprenorphine is the leading medication, while methadone is available only in a few specialised centres. T...

Authors: Viktor Mravčík, Barbara Janíková, Barbora Drbohlavová, Petr Popov and Alessandro Pirona

Gender differences in the provision of injection initiation assistance: a comparison of three North American settings

Individuals experience differential risks in their initiation into drug injecting based on their gender. Data suggest women are more likely to be injected after their initiator and to share injection equipment...

Authors: Stephanie A. Meyers, Ayden Scheim, Sonia Jain, Xiaoying Sun, M. J. Milloy, Kora DeBeck, Kanna Hayashi, Richard S. Garfein and Dan Werb

Challenges and opportunities for implementation of substance misuse interventions in conflict-affected populations

Alcohol and other drug misuse are significant but neglected public health issues in conflict-affected populations. In this article, we review the literature on the challenges and strategies for implementing su...

Authors: M. Claire Greene, Jeremy C. Kane, Kaveh Khoshnood, Peter Ventevogel and Wietse A. Tol

Assessing pharmacy student experience with, knowledge of and attitudes towards harm reduction: illuminating barriers to pharmacist-led harm reduction

As the burden from the opioid epidemic continues to increase in the state of Minnesota and across the nation, the University of Minnesota College of Pharmacy seeks to design an innovative, comprehensive harm r...

Authors: Lily Rowan Mahon, Amanda N. Hawthorne, Julie Lee, Heather Blue and Laura Palombi

Contraceptive utilization among new exotic dancers: a cross-sectional study

Female exotic dancers are a population at high risk of unintended pregnancy. The objective of this study is to describe the reproductive health needs and contraceptive utilization of exotic dancers.

Authors: Mishka Terplan, Caitlin E. Martin, Jennifer Nail and Susan G. Sherman

Perspectives on HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) utilization and related intervention needs among people who inject drugs

Antiretroviral pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) is clinically efficacious and recommended for HIV prevention among people who inject drugs (PWID), but uptake remains low and intervention needs are understudied....

Authors: K. B. Biello, A. R. Bazzi, M. J. Mimiaga, D. L. Biancarelli, A. Edeza, P. Salhaney, E. Childs and M. L. Drainoni

Study of human rights violations faced by women who use drugs in Estonia

Estonia continues to have the highest prevalence of HIV among people who inject drugs, and the highest overdose mortality, in the European Union. In August 2017, the Eurasian Harm Reduction Association (EHRA),...

Authors: Arune Kontautaite, Daria Matyushina-Ocheret, Maria Plotko, Mikhail Golichenko, Mart Kalvet and Lena Antonova

Opinion of health professionals and drug users before the forthcoming opening of the first drug consumption room in Paris: a quantitative cross-sectional study

On the brink of the opening of the first French drug consumption room in Paris, the general opinion of the local involved health care professionals and drug users was not known. The objective of this study was...

Authors: Grégoire Cleirec, Maeva Fortias, Vanessa Bloch, Virgile Clergue-Duval, Frank Bellivier, Thomas Dusouchet, Céline Debaulieu and Florence Vorspan

Peer-delivered harm reduction and recovery support services: initial evaluation from a hybrid recovery community drop-in center and syringe exchange program

Recovery from substance use disorder (SUD) is often considered at odds with harm reduction strategies. More recently, harm reduction has been categorized as both a pathway to recovery and a series of services ...

Authors: Robert D. Ashford, Brenda Curtis and Austin M. Brown

Young people’s awareness of the timing and placement of gambling advertising on traditional and social media platforms: a study of 11–16-year-olds in Australia

Research has demonstrated that the promotion of gambling, particularly within sport, may have a significant impact on positively shaping young people’s attitudes towards gambling. While some governments have i...

Authors: Samantha L. Thomas, Amy Bestman, Hannah Pitt, Rebecca Cassidy, Simone McCarthy, Christian Nyemcsok, Sean Cowlishaw and Mike Daube

Concentrations of nicotine, nitrosamines, and humectants in legal and illegal cigarettes in Mexico

Article 10 of the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control states the need for industry disclosure of tobacco contents and emissions. Currently, the profiles of key tobacco compounds i...

Authors: Ariela Braverman-Bronstein, James F Thrasher, Luz Myriam Reynales-Shigematsu, Mauricio Hernández-Ávila and Tonatiuh Barrientos-Gutierrez

Understanding the business versus care paradox in gambling venues: a qualitative study of the perspectives from gamblers, venue staff and counsellors

In recent years, greater emphasis has been placed on gambling venues to identify potential problem gamblers, respond appropriately and refer to treatment. In seeking the perspectives of problem gamblers, venue...

Authors: Ben J. Riley, Simone Orlowski, David Smith, Michael Baigent, Malcolm Battersby and Sharon Lawn

Acceptability of prison-based take-home naloxone programmes among a cohort of incarcerated men with a history of regular injecting drug use

Take-home naloxone (THN) programmes are an evidence-based opioid overdose prevention initiative. Elevated opioid overdose risk following prison release means release from custody provides an ideal opportunity ...

Authors: Michael Curtis, Paul Dietze, Campbell Aitken, Amy Kirwan, Stuart A. Kinner, Tony Butler and Mark Stoové

Acceptance of pharmaceutical cannabis substitution by cannabis using patients with schizophrenia

Cannabis-smoking patients with a psychotic disorder have poorer disease outcomes than non-cannabis-smoking patients with poorest outcomes in patients smoking high-potency cannabis (HPC) containing high Δ9-tetr...

Authors: Jan van Amsterdam, Jojanneke Vervloet, Gerdien de Weert, Victor J. A. Buwalda, Anna E. Goudriaan and Wim van den Brink

Evaluation of a fentanyl drug checking service for clients of a supervised injection facility, Vancouver, Canada

British Columbia, Canada, is experiencing a public health emergency related to opioid overdoses driven by consumption of street drugs contaminated with illicitly manufactured fentanyl. This cross-sectional stu...

Authors: Mohammad Karamouzian, Carolyn Dohoo, Sara Forsting, Ryan McNeil, Thomas Kerr and Mark Lysyshyn

Problem gambling and psychological distress: a cross-national perspective on the mediating effect of consumer debt and debt problems among emerging adults

Severe economic difficulties are common among younger generations who currently have an easy access to consumer credit and payday loans in many Western countries. These accessible yet expensive short-term loan...

Authors: Atte Oksanen, Iina Savolainen, Anu Sirola and Markus Kaakinen

Feasibility of needle and syringe programs in Tajikistan distributing low dead space needles

In 2012, the World Health Organization recommended that needle and syringe programs offer their clients low dead space insulin syringes with permanently attached needles. However, in many countries, these syri...

Authors: William A. Zule, Alisher Latypov, David Otiashvili, Steffani Bangel and Georgiy V. Bobashev

A qualitative study of persons who inject drugs but who have never helped others with first injections: how their views on helping contrast with the views of persons who have helped with first injections, and implications for interventions

Transitioning from non-injection to injection drug use dramatically escalates health risks. Evidence suggests that people who inject drugs (PWID) help in a majority of others’ first injections, yet these helpe...

Authors: David M. Barnes, Don C. Des Jarlais, Margaret Wolff, Jonathan Feelemyer and Susan Tross

Beyond cure: patient reported outcomes of hepatitis C treatment among people who inject drugs in Australia

Recent advances in the treatment of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection provide the possibility of eliminating HCV as a public health threat. This focus on HCV elimination through treatment, however, is also dri...

Authors: Annie Madden, Max Hopwood, Joanne Neale and Carla Treloar

From client to co-worker: a case study of the transition to peer work within a multi-disciplinary hepatitis c treatment team in Toronto, Canada

Despite the integration of peer workers into harm reduction services, there is little documentation regarding the experience of this integration or of models in which peers are fully integrated as members of h...

Authors: Paula Tookey, Kate Mason, Jennifer Broad, Marty Behm, Lise Bondy and Jeff Powis

Need for women-centered treatment for substance use disorders: results from focus group discussions

There are few women-centered treatment programs for substance use disorder. We therefore undertook an exploratory study to better understand the treatment experience, barriers, and facilitators of mothers with...

Authors: Natasha Elms, Kendra Link, Adam Newman and Susan B. Brogly

A policy analysis exploring hepatitis C risk, prevention, testing, treatment and reinfection within Australia’s prisons

Hepatitis C (HCV) is a global public health concern. There is a global prevalence of 15% among the world’s prisoner population, suggesting the need for priority HCV treatment among this population group. New h...

Authors: Lise Lafferty, T. Cameron Wild, Jake Rance and Carla Treloar

Developing E-cigarette friendly smoking cessation services in England: staff perspectives

Public health leadership in England has taken a distinctive international stance by identifying the potential public health benefit of e-cigarettes for smoking cessation. This includes the development of a gro...

Authors: Hannah Farrimond and Charles Abraham

Correction to: Global and local perspectives on tobacco harm reduction: what are the issues and where do we go from here?

After publication of the original article [1], the authors noticed an error in the Competing interests section.

Authors: Sharon Cox and Lynne Dawkins

A pragmatic harm reduction approach to manage a large outbreak of wound botulism in people who inject drugs, Scotland 2015

People who inject drugs (PWID) are at an increased risk of wound botulism, a potentially fatal acute paralytic illness. During the first 6 months of 2015, a large outbreak of wound botulism was confirmed among...

Authors: Kirsten M. A. Trayner, Amanda Weir, Andrew McAuley, Gauri Godbole, Corinne Amar, Kathie Grant, Gillian Penrice and Kirsty Roy

Pain as a risk factor for substance use: a qualitative study of people who use drugs in British Columbia, Canada

People who use drugs have a significantly higher prevalence of chronic non-cancer pain compared to the general population, yet little is known about how various policy, economic, physical, and social environme...

Authors: Pauline Voon, Alissa M. Greer, Ashraf Amlani, Cheri Newman, Charlene Burmeister and Jane A. Buxton

Fentanyl-contaminated drugs and non-fatal overdose among people who inject drugs in Baltimore, MD

The opioid crisis remains a major public health issue in the US and beyond. Despite rapid rises in fentanyl-related mortality nationally, little is known about the role of fentanyl in the occurrence of non-fat...

Authors: Ju Nyeong Park, Brian W. Weir, Sean T. Allen, Patrick Chaulk and Susan G. Sherman

Changing patterns of first e-cigarette flavor used and current flavors used by 20,836 adult frequent e-cigarette users in the USA

Understanding the role that flavors play in the population’s use of e-cigarettes and the impact that flavored e-cigarette products have on the population’s use of more harmful tobacco products, like convention...

Authors: Christopher Russell, Neil McKeganey, Tiffany Dickson and Mitchell Nides

Global and local perspectives on tobacco harm reduction: what are the issues and where do we go from here?

Authors: Sharon Cox and Lynne Dawkins

The unique contribution of e-cigarettes for tobacco harm reduction in supporting smoking relapse prevention

We have little understanding of how vapers use e-cigarettes beyond cessation. E-cigarettes may have a role to play in reducing the health-related harms of tobacco smoking, through not only assisting smoking ce...

Authors: Caitlin Notley, Emma Ward, Lynne Dawkins and Richard Holland

The “here and now” of youth: the meanings of smoking for sexual and gender minority youth

The mainstream tobacco field in the USA tends to situate youth as passive, particularly in terms of their susceptibility to industry manipulation and peer pressure. However, failing to acknowledge youths’ agen...

Authors: Tamar M. J. Antin, Geoffrey Hunt and Emile Sanders

“Who has ever loved a drug addict? It’s a lie. They think a ‘teja’ is as bad person”: multiple stigmas faced by women who inject drugs in coastal Kenya

A tenth of all people who inject drugs in Kenya are women, yet their social contexts and experiences remain poorly understood. This paper reports how multiple forms of stigma are experienced by women who injec...

Authors: Gitau Mburu, Sylvia Ayon, Alexander C. Tsai, James Ndimbii, Bangyuan Wang, Steffanie Strathdee and Janet Seeley

Cost of provision of opioid substitution therapy provision in Tijuana, Mexico

Mexico recently enacted drug policy reform to decriminalize possession of small amounts of illicit drugs and mandated that police refer identified substance users to drug treatment. However, the economic impli...

Authors: Jose Luis Burgos, Javier A. Cepeda, James G. Kahn, Maria Luisa Mittal, Emilio Meza, Raúl Rafael Palacios Lazos, Psyché Calderón Vargas, Peter Vickerman, Steffanie A. Strathdee and Natasha K. Martin

Comparing risk environments for HIV among people who inject drugs from three cities in Northern Mexico

A large body of research has investigated the rise of injection drug use and HIV transmission in Tijuana and Ciudad Juarez (CJ). However, little is known about the dynamics of injecting in Hermosillo. This stu...

Authors: Angelica Ospina-Escobar, Carlos Magis-Rodríguez, Fatima Juárez, Dan Werb, Sergio Bautista Arredondo, Rubén Carreón, María Elena Ramos and Steffanie Strathdee

Toots, tastes and tester shots: user accounts of drug sampling methods for gauging heroin potency

Internationally, overdose is the primary cause of death among people injecting drugs. However, since 2001, heroin-related overdose deaths in the United States (US) have risen sixfold, paralleled by a rise in t...

Authors: Sarah G. Mars, Jeff Ondocsin and Daniel Ciccarone

Harm reduction and viral hepatitis C in European prisons: a cross-sectional survey of 25 countries

Current estimates suggest that 15% of all prisoners worldwide are chronically infected with the hepatitis C virus (HCV), and this number is even higher in regions with high rates of injecting drug use. Althoug...

Authors: Rob Bielen, Samya R. Stumo, Rachel Halford, Klára Werling, Tatjana Reic, Heino Stöver, Geert Robaeys and Jeffrey V. Lazarus

Prevalence of hepatitis C virus infection among prisoners in Iran: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is one of the major public health problems both in developed and developing countries. Prison represents a high-risk environment for prisoners, in that it is characterized by high-risk ...

Authors: Masoud Behzadifar, Hasan Abolghasem Gorji, Aziz Rezapour and Nicola Luigi Bragazzi

‘Care and Prevent’: rationale for investigating skin and soft tissue infections and AA amyloidosis among people who inject drugs in London

Skin and soft tissue infections (SSTIs) are a leading cause of morbidity and mortality among people who inject drugs (PWID). International data indicate up to one third of PWID have experienced an SSTI within ...

Authors: M. Harris, R. Brathwaite, Catherine R. McGowan, D. Ciccarone, G. Gilchrist, M. McCusker, K. O’Brien, J. Dunn, J. Scott and V. Hope

Women’s gambling behaviour, product preferences, and perceptions of product harm: differences by age and gambling risk status

Women’s participation in, and harm from gambling, is steadily increasing. There has been very limited research to investigate how gambling behaviour, product preferences, and perceptions of gambling harm may v...

Authors: Simone McCarthy, Samantha L. Thomas, Melanie Randle, Amy Bestman, Hannah Pitt, Sean Cowlishaw and Mike Daube

Origins in the USA in the 1980s of the warning that smokeless tobacco is not a safe alternative to cigarettes: a historical, documents-based assessment with implications for comparative warnings on less harmful tobacco/nicotine products

Before the 1980s in the USA, smokeless tobacco carried no health warnings, was not judged to cause disease, and was a declining practice. In 1986, the federal government passed legislation requiring rotating w...

Authors: Lynn T. Kozlowski

Electronic cigarette use in Greece: an analysis of a representative population sample in Attica prefecture

The purpose was to assess prevalence and correlates of electronic cigarette (e-cigarette) use in Greece in 2017.

Authors: Konstantinos E. Farsalinos, Georgios Siakas, Konstantinos Poulas, Vassilis Voudris, Kyriakoula Merakou and Anastasia Barbouni

‘Worth the test?’ Pragmatism, pill testing and drug policy in Australia

Recent deaths of young Australian music festival attendees from ‘party-drug’ overdoses have sparked debate about the effectiveness of drug policies. Australia is widely lauded for its harm minimisation approac...

Authors: Andrew Groves

Expanding harm reduction to include fentanyl urine testing: results from a pilot in rural British Columbia

Harm reduction has been at the forefront of the response to the opioid overdose public health emergency in British Columbia (BC). The unprecedented number of opioid overdose deaths in the province calls for an...

Authors: Silvina C. Mema, Chloe Sage, Serge Popoff, Jessica Bridgeman, Deanne Taylor and Trevor Corneil

Lay responder naloxone access and Good Samaritan law compliance: postcard survey results from 20 Indiana counties

To reduce fatal drug overdoses, two approaches many states have followed is to pass laws expanding naloxone access and Good Samaritan protections for lay persons with high likelihood to respond to an opioid ov...

Authors: Dennis P. Watson, Bradley Ray, Lisa Robison, Philip Huynh, Emily Sightes, La Shea Walker, Krista Brucker and Joan Duwve

From problem people to addictive products: a qualitative study on rethinking gambling policy from the perspective of lived experience

Previous research has shown that government and industry discussions of gambling may focus on personal responsibility for gambling harm. In Australia, these discussions have largely excluded people with lived ...

Authors: Helen E. Miller, Samantha L. Thomas and Priscilla Robinson

Government and public health responses to e-cigarettes in New Zealand: vapers’ perspectives

The New Zealand (NZ) government is to lift the ban on the sale of nicotine for use in electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes).

Authors: Trish Fraser, Marewa Glover and Penelope Truman

Methamphetamine-type stimulant use in Lao PDR: qualitative findings from users aged 15–25 years in Vientiane Capital and Vientiane Province

Methamphetamine is one of the most widely used illicit drugs in several Southeast Asian countries, including the Lao People’s Democratic Republic (PDR). The purpose of this study was to examine the socio-cultu...

Authors: Vanphanom Sychareun, Bangone Santavasy, Niramonh Chanlivong, Andrea Fischer, Nicholas Thomson, Robert Power and Jo Durham

Attitudes towards community gambling venues and support for regulatory reform: an online panel study of residents in New South Wales, Australia

Harmful gambling has been identified as an important public health issue that affects individuals, families and the broader community. One gambling product, electronic gambling machines (EGMs), has been associ...

Authors: Amy Bestman, Samantha L. Thomas, Melanie Randle, Hannah Pitt and Mike Daube

Hospitalization among street-involved youth who use illicit drugs in Vancouver, Canada: a longitudinal analysis

Street-involved youth who use illicit drugs are at high risk for health-related harms; however, the profile of youth at greatest risk of hospitalization has not been well described. We sought to characterize h...

Authors: Derek C. Chang, Launette Rieb, Ekaterina Nosova, Yang Liu, Thomas Kerr and Kora DeBeck