AOD Update - News and Resources on Alcohol and Other Drugs

Minnesota Department of Health sent this bulletin at 12/19/2024 10:01 AM CST

AOD Update – December 2024

View this as a webpage

December 19, 2024

NEWS AND RESOURCES ON ALCOHOL AND OTHER DRUGS

Events and announcements

Alcohol taxes save lives: Using tax policies to reduce alcohol-related harms (Prevention First) - Jan. 9 from 10 to 11 a.m.

Working toward equity in cannabis policy (University of Minnesota School of Public Health) - Jan. 28 from 2 to 3 p.m.

Recommendations from the Task Force on Pregnancy Health and Substance Use disorders (MDH)

“Outsmart Nicotine”: Truth Initiative launches national campaign to help young people quit vaping with EX Program (Truth Initiative)

New resources!

Eliminating tobacco-related disease and death: Addressing disparities (PDF) (HHS)

Data and research

Detection of illegally manufactured fentanyl and carfentanil in drug overdose deaths — United States, 2021–2024 (MMWR)

Parents and cannabis: Adolescents' reports of parent-related factors associated with their attitudes about and intentions to use cannabis (Journal of Child and Family Studies)

Too insensitive to care: Alcohol increases human aggression by increasing pain threshold (Journal on Studies on Alcohol and Drugs)

New clinical and public health challenges: Increasing trends in United States alcohol related mortality (The American Journal of Medicine)

Prevalence and correlates of alcohol and drug harms to others: Findings from the 2020 U.S. National Alcohol Survey (Journal on Studies on Alcohol and Drugs)

Exposure to marijuana in the womb may increase risk of addiction to opioids later in life, study finds (University of Maryland School of Medicine)
Rates of receiving medication for opioid use disorder and opioid overdose deaths during the early synthetic opioid crisis: A county-level analysis (Epidemiology)

Alcohol

This drinking habit is more dangerous than bingeing (New York Times)

In the news: To battle the bullet, Baltimore goes after the bottle (Alcohol Research Group)

Minnesota officials are stepping up DWI enforcement to combat ‘incredible and unacceptable’ trend (Star Tribune)

The dangers of drinking and driving: Risks, laws, and consequences (Drug Free)

BORG drinking trend: What parents need to know (Drug Free)

Cannabis

FDA gives green light to PTSD marijuana study in veterans (The Hill)

Maryland unveils marijuana health tracking dashboard (WYPR)

Researcher Ken Winters highlights the risks of cannabis to developing brains (MinnPost)

Opioids and prescription drugs

How should the opioid settlements be spent? Those hit hardest often don’t have a say (AP News)

'Historic' drop in U.S. overdose deaths accelerates as fentanyl crisis eases (NPR)

Less-potent fentanyl pills may be playing a role in decrease of US overdose deaths, DEA says (CNN)

Opioid use disorder is associated with changes in brain structure, function (Yale News)

CDC warns rise in opioid that's 100 times more potent than fentanyl (New York Post)

Drug "three times more powerful than fentanyl" linked to California overdose death (CBS News)

Commercial tobacco and e-cigarettes

Supreme Court doesn’t seem convinced FDA was unfair in blocking flavored vapes as teen use increased (AP News)

Navajo Nation’s bold move to increase tobacco taxes & fund cultural prevention programs (Public Health Law Center)

How social media promotion of vaping target teens (Yale School of Medicine)

Lessons learned from e-cigarettes should affect FDA regulation of nicotine pouches (JAMA)

Psychedelic medicine

VA funds first study on psychedelic-assisted therapy for Veterans (VA News)

Brain circuits behind psychedelics’ anti-anxiety power decoded (Neuroscience News)

Psilocybin’s mental health benefits may include improved sleep (PsyPost)

Psilocybin can lift depression in clinicians who worked on COVID-19 frontlines, trial finds (University of Minnesota)

Learn more by visiting the MDH Alcohol and Other Drugs website.

Questions?

Contact the Injury and Violence Prevention Section: health.injuryprevention@state.mn.us.

Do you have news or resources to contribute to the next AOD Update? Send them to Kari Gloppen at kari.gloppen@state.mn.us.