New findings from the International Alcohol Control (IAC) Study, led by researchers at the SHORE & Whariki Research Centre, College of Health,  have been published in a Special Issue just released in Drug and Alcohol Review.

The IAC Special Issue includes data from 10 countries on key alcohol policy issues such as taxation, availability, support for policy and drinking behaviour. Countries included  New Zealand, Australia, Scotland and England and a number of middle-income countries including: Mongolia, Thailand, Viet Nam, Peru and South Africa.

Taisia Huckle (pictured) said ‘ The IAC is producing important policy relevant information and it has been a great experience working with a large number of international collaborators’.

Associate Professor Chris Wilkins, speaking this morning to TVNZ 1's Breakfast programme, said the number of arrests for cannabis has fallen by about 70 per cent since 1990, as police are increasingly uninterested in punishing people for related offences. 

See more details here.

Professor Casswell is part of the Sugar Tobacco and Alcohol Taxes (STAX) Group, an international group of experts, including from the UN. WHO and World Bank, whose article on the health benefits of sugar, alcohol and tobacco taxes was published recently in The Lancet. Their research was cited on the Stuff website, 17 June, in an article titled Coca-Cola recruiting lobbyist to fight sugar tax, despite new research revealing such taxes can save lives.

The Journal of Transport & Health is providing free access until August 02, 2018 to two recent articles co-authored by researchers at SHORE & Whāriki. Click on the titles of the articles following to download them: Te Ara Mua –Future Streets: Knowledge exchange and the highs and lows of researcher-practitioner collaboration to design active travel infrastructure, and Built environment associates of active school travel in New Zealand children and youth: A systematic meta-analysis using individual participant data.

New research from Massey University shows little evidence that changes introduced by the Sale and Supply of Alcohol Act (2012) have affected New Zealand’s alcohol environment.

The research, led by Steve Randerson from the SHORE and Whāriki Research Centre, was today published in the New Zealand Medical Journal. See more details here.

Improving youth wellbeing is an increasing priority of policymakers, researchers and politicians in New Zealand, but what does wellbeing mean to young New Zealanders today? 

A new research project, led by Dr Octavia Calder-Dawe with Victoria Lesatele and Emerald Muriwai from Massey University’s SHORE and Whāriki Research Centre, has been awarded an emerging researcher grant of nearly $250,000 from the Health Research Council of New Zealand.

See more details here.

The report on the findings from the latest Massey University Illicit Drug Monitoring System (IDMS) is available to download here. For more information see the article on the Massey University news page and interview with Associate Professor Chris Wilkins on Breakfast (TVNZ). Details of other research by Chris Wilkins are available here on his profile page.

Nicola is of Samoan, Tongan and Niuean heritage and during her PhD journey, she moved to Australia, married Andrew and had three children.

Her PhD thesis, Samoan Kids in the City is about the impact of Samoan parenting practices on Samoan children’s independent mobility and physical activity.  Children’s independent mobility – unsupervised play and travel - is an essential component of physical activity for children. Her research concluded that independent mobility was not an effective tool for measuring Samoan children’s physical activity levels because children were encouraged and motivated by their parents and ‘aiga (extended family) to participate in collective activities.

See more detail here.

A report is available about new research led by Dr. Taisia Huckle from SHORE & Whariki showing social supply of alcohol to friends under 18 has reduced following a law change (Sale and Supply of Alcohol Act 2012), but the quantities of alcohol supplied are still alarmingly high.

The report can be found here.

Marta Rychert was awarded her Ph.D. at the Massey University graduation ceremony at the Bruce Mason Centre in Takapuna, Auckland. Marta studied issues with the implementation of the Psychoactive Substances Act (PSA) 2013.

See more detail about her doctoral research here.

 

Check out our second research bulletin from the New Zealand Drug Trends survey on drug dependency and need for help for your region here.

Read about the preliminary findings from the NZ Drug Trends Survey here.

New research led by Dr Taisia Huckle from SHORE & Whariki  shows social supply of alcohol to friends under 18 has reduced following a law change (Sale and Supply of Alcohol Act 2012), but the quantities of alcohol supplied are still alarmingly high. Two national general population surveys of drinkers were analysed before and after the law change, which came into effect on December 1 2013. Dr Huckle was interviewed for a New Zealand Herald article about the study’s findings.

Professor Sally Casswell appeared on TVNZ's Breakfast programme discussing alcohol licencing and taxes after a call for a price rise. Watch the video here.

Belinda Borell is the recipient of the Hohua Tutengaehe Fellowship funded by the Health Research Council of New Zealand. Belinda has a particular interest in rangatahi and identity and how this relates to wellbeing, and has developed expertise in the role societal structures and institutions play in producing and maintaining health inequities, particularly for the privileged members of our society. Her previous research and PhD examined these issues using qualitative methods and she will be looking to explore this further using a kaupapa Māori-based Q-sort approach developed in Whariki. This will provide her with an opportunity to extend knowledge and upskill in this methodology, which includes quantitative analyses.

Online alcohol and drug survey now live

The SHORE & Whāriki drug research team, led by Associate Professor Chris Wilkins, has launched a new study on alcohol and drug use throughout the country, which includes  a national online survey. Levels of alcohol and drugs in wastewater will also be measured.

The online alcohol and drug survey is now live and can be self-completed from a smart phone, tablet or computer via this website: https://drugs.shore.ac.nz; over the phone on 0800 554 101; or face-to-face with an interviewer on request, by texting the word “research” to 0800 554 101.

The International Alcohol Control (IAC) study celebrated the launch of the Book of Abstracts of the forthcoming Special Issue of Drug and Alcohol Review at the recent Global Alcohol Policy Conference in Melbourne. The launch was funded by the International Development Research Centre, Canada, which has also funded open access to the Special Issue of the journal .

Professor Sally Casswell, as Chair of the Global Alcohol Policy Alliance, was co-host and member of the organizing committee for the Global Alcohol Policy Conference (GAPC17) held in Melbourne 5-7 October. Dr Taisia Huckle, Mr Steve Randerson, Marta Rychert and Thomas Graydon Guy, SHORE & Whariki Research Centre, College of Health attended the conference.

Professor Casswell organized a pre-conference symposium on 3 October – on alcohol and development where participants from low and middle income countries shared experience in research and advocacy with a focus on the alcohol development issues.

A working meeting of the International Alcohol Control (IAC) study meeting was convened by Dr Taisia Huckle prior to the GAPC17 conference in Melbourne and Professor Charles Parry, Director: Alcohol, Tobacco and Other Drug Research Unit South African Medical Research Council is visiting for a week to discuss cross country IAC publications.

Associate Professor Chris Wilkins and Marta Rychert are the lead authors of a chapter on ‘Exploring innovative policy responses to NPS and ‘legal highs’ in New Zealand, Poland, Republic of Ireland and the UK’ in Novel Psychoactive Substances: Policy, Economics and Drug Regulation, published recently by Springer. Click here for more information.

Associate Professor Chris Wilkins will be a presenter in Part 2 of the webinar series Monitoring Drug Trends in Australasia hosted by the National Drug Early Warning System (NDEWS) at the Center for Substance Abuse Research (CESAR), University of Maryland, College Park (UMCP). The webinar titled Examining Global Drug Early Warning Systems will take place on Wednesday, September 27, 2017 at 10.00am – 11.30am (NZ time). The webinars are designed to explore current practices utilized by existing international drug early warning systems (DEWS) with the aim of developing guidance to support countries interested in establishing new DEWS or enhancing existing programs.

The webinar will last approximately 90 minutes. 

In order to participate, you must have an internet connection, a web browser, and speakers (to listen).

To ensure your space, please register at: 

https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_gXnhlDvMRQag6qX165te5Q