The Australian Drug Blog

October 6, 2011, was an unusually silent Thursday night in Blacker Hovse. The courtyard was quiet, devoid of the loud music usually played by Ricketts Hovse on such a night. The crowd usually attracted by Thursday Night Drinking, or TND, in Ricketts, was suspiciously absent. The evening was disturbingly calm.Calm, until Priyam Patel ran into an otherwise placid Blacker lounge and yelled:“Alcohol has been banned on campus!”Caltech, like many private colleges across the nation, is a “wet” school. Students of-age (over 21) are allowed to possess and consume alcohol in private. According to the previous alcohol policy, officially registered student parties could serve alcohol via bartenders with relatively little hassle or approval required. Major campus parties such as Big Interhouse (Big I), as well as smaller parties such as Apache or Page Interhouse, have historically had free-flowing booze available through the alcohol policy. The primary requirements of the old policy were the existence of an “Event Host” to organize the paperwork, “professional bartenders” to serve the alcohol, and permission from three organizations, including the Undergraduate Deans. But this may no longer be the case.
Via tech.caltech.edu

Lager drinkers are in for a shock after brewing giant AB InBev decided to cut the alcohol volume in Stella Artois, Budweiser and Beck’s, according to The Grocer.
The shake-up of the three top brands should save millions of pounds that will offset duty hikes and cost increases, the trade magazine says.
The world’s largest brewer is cutting the alcohol volume of the popular beers from 5per cent to 4.8per cent.

Via www.dailymail.co.uk

A second roll-your-own-cigarette smoke shop, Green Leaf Smokes, has opened up at 1326 Sheepshead Bay Road, off the corner of East 14th Street. It’s the second such business to open in the area, following the November opening of City Smokes at 2695 Coney Island Avenue.These shops allow customers to come in and pick a blend of “organic” tobacco that is mixed to emulate the flavors of big brands. Customers buy the tobacco loose, purchase papers and filters, and then use the store’s rolling machines to roll up their own cigarettes.It’s a new type of business designed to get around the high taxes the city charges for pre-rolled cigarettes. However, two of the oldest stores in New York City – one in Chinatown and one in Manhattan – were the target of a city lawsuit claiming they’re illegally dodging the taxes, since customers still walk out of the store with rolled cigarrettes.
Via www.sheepsheadbites.com

Health groups call for federal action on kid-friendly tobacco novelties.On the occasion of National Non Smoking Week, a group of national and provincial health agencies is calling for the federal government to crack down on the marketing of tobacco novelties aimed at youth.“Within the shadow of Parliament Hill, we were easily able to find deadly tobacco products that look like candy or a fruit roll-up,” said Dr. Atul Kapur, President of Physicians for a Smoke-Free Canada. “These are exactly the types of products that the government set out to ban three years ago.” Dr. Kapur displayed some of the 19 different products that were found in over 60 different flavours in stores in downtown Ottawa.When the Cracking Down on Tobacco Marketing Aimed at Youth Act was passed in September 2009, there was a widespread belief that this new law would end the sale of flavoured cigarillos, as it was intended to do. There was also widespread hope among many that the government would extend the ban to flavoured smokeless tobacco and flavoured shisha (waterpipe tobacco).
Via www.smoke-free.ca

Men’s lacrosse players were the biggest illicit drug users among athletes competing in the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s 23 sanctioned sports, according to a survey by the governing body.
They led all other sports in the use of amphetamines, anabolic steroids, cocaine, marijuana and narcotics, according to the NCAA’s quadrennial survey, which included 20,474 responses from athletes for the 2009 school year.
The athletes were asked to voluntarily fill out forms anonymously, then mail them in postage-paid envelopes to a company that scanned them and put the answers into a database. The report offered no comparison with drug use in either the general population or college population as a whole.
Since the last survey in 2005, college athletes have increased their use of drugs including alcohol (83.1 percent, up from 77.5 percent), cigarettes (15.5 percent from 14.6 percent), marijuana (22.6 percent from 21.2 percent) and spit tobacco (17.4 percent from 15.7 percent).
Via www.bloomberg.com

Suicides among active-duty soldiers hit a new high in 2011, Army officials said on Thursday, although there was a slight decrease in suicides overall, if non-mobilized Reserve and National Guard troops were included in the calculation.The Army also reported a sharp increase, of nearly 30 percent, in violent sex crimes last year by active-duty troops. More than half of the victims were active-duty female soldiers between 18 and 21.“This is unacceptable,” Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli, the outgoing vice chief of staff of the Army, said of the violent sex offenses, “We have zero tolerance for this.” General Chiarelli, speaking at a news conference, said the factors driving the increase in sex crimes were alcohol use and new barracks that offered soldiers more privacy than in the past. He also said it was possible that more victims were stepping forward to report crimes.
Via atwar.blogs.nytimes.com

Drinking alcohol causes a pleasant feeling because it releases endorphins, the brain’s natural opioids. But a new study has found that problem drinkers differ from social drinkers in the way alcohol affects one part of the brain. The report appeared Wednesday in Science Translational Medicine. Researchers performed PET imaging on 13 heavy drinkers and 12 social drinkers after each had had a standardized amount of alcohol. The scientists traced the release of endorphins in two regions of the brain — the nucleus accumbens and the orbitofrontal cortex.
Via www.nytimes.com

Several cruise lines have further limited smoking on ships, leaving a few designated areas as the last refuge to light up at sea.Princess Cruises’ guests won’t be allowed to smoke in staterooms or on balconies starting with sailings on Monday. Three other lines recently tightened their smoking rules or will join Princess in doing so next week. ”Our consumer studies now show that smokers are a small minority of our passengers, and that the large majority of passengers value having their primary living space onboard smoke-free,” Executive Vice President Jan Swartz said in a statement.In 2010, only 19.3 percent of Americans, or 45.3 million adults, smoked cigarettes, down from 20.9 percent in 2005, according to federal health regulators.The new smoking policy also reflects a worldwide effort to restrict areas where smoking is allowed, the Santa Clarita, Calif.-based cruise operator said.
Via www.sun-sentinel.com