Ranking the Harm of Alcohol, Tobacco and Illicit Drugs for the Individual and the Population

Amsterdam, Jan van; Opperhuizen, Antoon; Koeter, Maarten W. J.; Brink, Wim van den

doi:10.1159/000317249

Cited by 172 publications

(166 citation statements)

References 8 publications

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“…In addition, injected and smoked street heroin were evaluated for comparison. Illicit or non-medical use of opioids can create harms to users and harms to others, a distinction that had been used before in the assessment of the overall harm of alcohol, tobacco and a number of illicit drugs (van Amsterdam et al, 2010, Nutt et al, 2010.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ranking the harm of non-medically used prescription opioids in the UK

Amsterdam

Phillips

Henderson

et al. 2015

Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology

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Running head: ranking prescription opioidsKey words: opioids, MCDA, risk assessment, ranking, prescription drugs, harm,street heroin Both forms of heroin scored very high: overall harm score of 99 for injected heroin and 72 for smoked heroin on a scale of 0-100. The main feature that distinguishes both forms of street heroin use is that their harm to others is more than five times that of the other eleven opioids. The overall harm score of fentanyl (including injection of fentanyl extracted from patches) and diamorphine (medically prescribed form of heroin) was 54 and 51, respectively, whereas that of orally used opioids ranged from 32 (pethidine) to 11 (codeine-containing pharmaceuticals).Injected street heroin, fentanyl and diamorphine emerged as most harmful to users, with the latter two very low in harm to others.Pethidine, methadone, morphine and oxycodone are also low in harm to others, while moderate in harm to users.We conclude that the overall harms of non-medically used prescription opioids are less than half that of injected street heroin.These data may give a basis for precautionary regulatory measures that should be considered if the rising trend in non-medical use of prescription opioids were to become evident in the UK.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ranking the harm of non-medically used prescription opioids in the UK

Amsterdam

Phillips

Henderson

et al. 2015

Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology

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“…This invites to look in more detail at which harms are of relevance and how to assess those. British and Dutch experts developed models for risk and harm assessment (2,3). A detailed analysis of drug harms is based on 16 criteria in 3 clusters (physical, psychological, social) of harm to users and harms to others.…”

Section: Summary Statementmentioning

confidence: 99%

Which policy for new psychoactive drugs?

Uchtenhagen

2016

Addiction

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“…camente valorables 1 (van Amsterdam et al, 2010). Y los autores concluyen que la clasificación jurídica actual de las drogas necesita ser revisada incorporando todos los criterios de daño individual y social de cada una de ellas.…”

Section: La Epidemiología Del Consumo De Drogas En El Primer Mundounclassified

¿Cuáles y qué tan graves son los daños a la salud individual y a la sociedad causados por el consumo de drogas lícitas e ilícitas?

Romo‐González¹,

Larralde²

2013

Psychol.

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ResumenEn vista del amplio consumo de drogas lícitas e ilícitas en casi todo el mundo occidental, nosotros sospechamos que no eran tantos ni tan graves los daños que causan, como se afirma, y decidimos evaluar la solidez de tal sospecha. La sospecha resultó correcta en términos de la salud física individual de los usuarios, pues las drogas no aparecen entre las primeras quince causas de Morbilidad ni de Mortalidad en los habitantes de México, EUA, Canadá, España, el Reino Unido y Holanda. En cambio, las drogas sí causan daño psicológico y social al individuo por propiciar indolencia motivacional, cuadros psicóticos serios, potencialmente irreversibles, e inducir la comisión de conductas riesgosas (accidentes de tránsito) y hasta criminales (robos, asaltos, violaciones). El consumo de drogas también lesiona la integridad y economía de las familias de los usuarios y daña a la comunidad, pues se eleva la tasa de desempleo, disminuyen los ingresos fiscales, incrementan los costos de los programas de desarrollo, de seguridad y de beneficencia, así como propician la exclusión de los usuarios en el trabajo, escuelas, clubes y servicios públicos diversos. Nuestros resultados son de interés para el diseño de las acciones destinadas al control del consumo de drogas para que sean congruentes con el tipo, gravedad y extensión del daño individual y social que las drogas causen. Palabras clave: mortalidad, morbilidad, consumo drogas lícitas e ilícitas, costos. AbstractIn view of the widespread use of licit and illicit in most of the Western world, we suspect that there were not so many and so serious the damages that they cause, as stated, and we decided to assess the strength of such suspicion. The suspicion was correct in terms of physical health of individual users, as drugs do not appear among the top fifteen causes of morbidity or mortality in the population of Mexico, USA, Canada, Spain, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. However, drugs do cause psychological and social harm to the individual by promoting motivational indolence, serious psychotic symptoms potentially irreversible, and induce the commission of risky behaviors (traffic accidents) and even criminals (robbery, assault, rape). Drug use also damages the integrity and economy of the families of users and harms to the community, since it raises the rate of unemployment, lower tax revenues, increase costs of development programs, safety and welfare, and favor the exclusion of users in the workplace, schools, clubs and various utilities. Our results are of interest for the design of actions to control drug use to be consistent with the type, severity and extent of the individual and social harm that drugs cause.

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Ranking the Harm of Alcohol, Tobacco and Illicit Drugs for the Individual and the Population

Cited by 172 publications

References 8 publications

Ranking the harm of non-medically used prescription opioids in the UK

Ranking the harm of non-medically used prescription opioids in the UK

Which policy for new psychoactive drugs?

¿Cuáles y qué tan graves son los daños a la salud individual y a la sociedad causados por el consumo de drogas lícitas e ilícitas?

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