Alcohol brands defend
sports sponsorships
Alcohol makers including Diageo, Lion and Carlton and United
Breweries have defended their involvement in sports sponsorship after calls for
tighter restrictions on advertising within live broadcasts of sports matches.
The Australian Greens have claimed alcohol brands who sponsor live sports are
taking advantage of a “loophole” within regulations that allows them to
advertise before the 8:30 pm watershed which means children and young people
are exposed to the adverts. Richard Di Natale, acting leader of the party,
claims alcohol brands linking to cricket and football is the “dark side” of
Australian sport and claims it is fuelling a “dangerous and unhealthy” culture
of drinking. Lion says a ban on advertising or sponsorship is not the way to
deal with the complex issue of alcohol misuse and claims the argument is
"flawed". Australia has some of the most robust regulations around
advertising alcohol in the world, according to both Diageo and CUB, which both
have their own internal codes of practice as well as an industry-wide code. The
drinks makers have hit back at the accusations saying the claims don't tally
with the evidence. A spokesperson for Lion says sports sponsorship has no
impact on increasing consumption of alcohol, pointing out that while many beer
brands sponsor sports events, beer consumption is in decline. Its impact is
instead on brand preference.
The morning after the
night before
For those who nursed a New Year’s hangover, David Nutt, a
neuropsychopharmacologist at Imperial College London, has an idea with obvious
appeal: an alcohol substitute that promises all of the fun of bacchic revelry
without the throbbing head and washing-machine stomach that follow. Let us call
it synthehol – a name I’ve borrowed from Star Trek, in which spacefarers
explore strange new worlds without the distraction of anything so primitive as a
furry tongue. In November 2013, Nutt suggested that it was ‘well within the
grasp of modern neuroscience’ to develop a chemical concoction that packs the
punch of punch, while leaving us fresh as a daisy the next day. Even better, an
antidote could sequester the drug from our brains, allowing us to sober up in
minutes. He has even tried a few prototypes – compounds that target certain
neurotransmitter systems in the same way as alcohol – and felt ‘relaxed and
sleepily inebriated’. ‘All that is needed now is funding to test and put them
on the market,’ he adds. Click
here to continue reading.
No buzz but legally drunk:
Reporter tests breath-analysis gizmo
If you've ever sat at the pub after work sipping your
favorite Cabernet or craft brew, then you've probably wondered: When is it safe
to drive home? If your blood alcohol concentration reaches .08%, that means
someone else should take the keys. As millions head out to mark the shift from
2013 to 2014, knowing what to do is especially important. What would it feel
like to hit that magic number? How many drinks would it take? Click
here to continue reading.
The Policy Question About
Legal Weed Nobody Is Asking
Last week a couple of oldster pundits set the Internet
ablaze with deeply illogical columns in which they argued that because marijuana
consumption has some undesirable health and social consequences, the states
that are moving to make marijuana legal are clearly doing the wrong thing. The
problem here isn't the observation that there's some legitimate interests in
constraining marijuana consumption, it's with the inference. There are lots of
consumption possibilities for which it makes sense for public policy to promote
a culture of restraint—booze, cigarettes, Fritos—but where the downsides of
criminalization in terms of human freedom and enforcement costs are clearly far
too high. Marijuana, I think, also very clearly falls in that bucket.
Click here to continue reading.
First Up, Mental Illness.
Next Topic Is Up to You.
THOSE of us in the pundit world tend to blather on about
what happened yesterday, while often ignoring what happens every day. We stir
up topics already on the agenda, but we falter at calling attention to
crucial-but-neglected issues. Click
here to continue reading.
The Value of 'Affluenza,'
Addiction And Parental Neglect As Get Out Of Jail Defenses
What’s a disease and what’s an excuse for bad behavior?
These two questions are at the heart of virtually all debate over addiction and
drug policy—and the Texas “affluenza” case may help shed new light on them.
After stealing beer, getting drunk enough to reach three times the legal limit,
injuring nine people—and killing four in a gruesome crash—16-year-old Ethan Couch
was sentenced to just 10 years of probation and treatment. No prison time. He
will spend just a year at a California program for troubled teens (which
charges $450,000 annually). Not surprisingly, the sentence has provoked
widespread outrage. Click
here to continue reading.
Severe mental illness tied
to higher rates of substance use
New NIH study shows that certain protective factors do not
exist in those with severe mental illness
People with severe mental illness such as schizophrenia or
bipolar disorder have a higher risk for substance use, especially cigarette
smoking, and protective factors usually associated with lower rates of
substance use do not exist in severe mental illness, according to a new study
funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), part of the National
Institutes of Health. Click here to
continue reading.
Alcohol Leaves Its Mark on
Young People’s DNA
A new study analyzing the effects of weekend drinking among
college students has found that oxidative damage on the lipids comprising cell
membranes and its genetic material — DNA — is twice as high for students who
drink. The study, published in the journal Alcohol, notes that the effects of
alcohol abuse have been mostly studied in people who have been drinking for a
long time and who display symptoms ranging from liver damage to various types
of cancer, depression and disorders of the nervous system. . Click
here to continue reading.
Feds Push Doctor Talks To
Combat Excessive Drinking
The Centers for Disease Control’s Director Tom Frieden wants
American doctors to turn to an often overlooked treatment for America’s heavy drinking
habits: a conversation. Click
here to continue reading.
Abolish Fraternities
During their periodic bouts of consultant-managed angst,
U.S. companies are often encouraged to confront a single question: What
business are we in? It’s a process that might also benefit U.S. colleges and
universities with fraternities. Click
here to continue reading.
Art therapists devise
innovative project for addiction patients
From pairs of used shoes, Rosecrance Health Network recently
hit on that rare idea that can turn into a meaningful experience for adult
patients, adolescent patients, and program staff alike. Patients at
Rosecrance’s adult and adolescent campuses in Illinois used staff-donated shoes
as blank canvases on which to tell their life stories or relate their future
hopes through art. Patients then saw their work displayed in a gallery show
that generated extreme pride for both the patients and the Rosecrance
workforce. Click
here to continue reading.
STUDY: Stimulating brain
cells stops binge drinking
Researchers at the University at Buffalo have found a way to
change alcohol drinking behavior in rodents, using the emerging technique of
optogenetics, which uses light to stimulate neurons. Their work could lead to
powerful new ways to treat alcoholism, other addictions, and neurological and
mental illnesses; it also helps explain the underlying neurochemical basis of
drug addiction. The findings, published in November in Frontiers in
Neuroscience, are the first to demonstrate a causal relationship between the
release of dopamine in the brain and drinking behaviors of animals. Click
here to continue reading.
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