Alcohol crime in Northern Ireland reached 105,000 offences over the last five years, according to figures from the Department of Justice. The data covers cases where alcohol consumption by the offender, the victim, or both was a recorded aggravating factor. Experts say the numbers demand immediate cross-departmental attention. The region averages more than 20,000 alcohol-linked...
Here is a number worth sitting with: 316 million people used illicit drugs in 2023. Not a projection. Not a worst-case estimate. The opening finding of the UNODC World Drug Report 2025, published by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. That is roughly 6 per cent of every person on earth aged 15...
Tobacco and gambling spending drains the UK economy far more than most people realise. Yet for years, industry lobbyists have warned that tighter regulations on tobacco, gambling and unhealthy foods would devastate jobs. New research from the University of Sheffield says the opposite is true. A study published in the journal Addiction found that cutting...
Ireland has published a landmark draft national drugs strategy, setting out how the country plans to tackle the escalating harms of drug and alcohol misuse through 2026 to 2029. The Department of Health developed the blueprint, marking a decisive shift towards a health-led approach to drug use. It puts treatment, harm reduction and recovery ahead...
Prison drug misuse is driving a crisis that now reaches well beyond prison walls. A new report from the National Audit Office (NAO) exposes the full scale of drug use in prisons across England and Wales, and the findings demand urgent attention. Prison Drug Misuse: The Scale of the Problem About 40,000 people had an...
New figures show that alcohol-specific deaths in Northern Ireland have reached their highest level in 20 years. A total of 397 people lost their lives to alcohol-related causes in 2024. The data comes from the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA) and was published in February 2026. Indeed, the scale of the increase is...
The popularity of hemp-derived cannabis products has surged across Nebraska, despite the state’s prohibition on recreational marijuana. Traditional alcohol consumption has reached record lows nationwide. Meanwhile, THC drinks Nebraska residents can purchase have become increasingly mainstream in restaurants, bars, and major retail chains. These intoxicating beverages occupy a legal grey area. The 2018 Farm Bill...
The fentanyl epidemic has pushed San Francisco’s coroner’s office to breaking point. During a 24-hour span on 8 August 2023, nine people died from drug overdoses, eight of them from fentanyl. Workers collected eight bodies from flats across the city. Someone found one victim on the street across from City Hall. That month, drugs killed...
A Cumbrian charity supporting people battling addiction has raised the alarm over a worrying synthetic drug threat emerging on Britain’s streets. Workers are witnessing a sharp rise in nitazenes, powerful substances that can be up to 500 times stronger than heroin. The Well, based in Cumbria, currently treats around a quarter of its clients specifically...
A landmark study from the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre (NDARC) at UNSW Sydney, published on 3 February 2026 in the journal Addiction, reveals a dramatic rise in harms associated with gamma-hydroxybutyrate (GHB). GHB-related deaths increased tenfold from fewer than six in 2012–13 to 52 in 2021–22. Hospitalisations more than tripled, rising from 5.3...