The coronavirus pandemic has presented a new challenge for public health services around the world.

Although scientists are working tirelessly to comprehend more about the virus, there are still many unanswered questions.

In a recent interview, Dr. Nora Volkow, who heads the National Institute on Drug Abuse, describes factors that may increase the risk of coronavirus causing greater harm to the infected individual.

Read the full interview here.

What is Naloxone?

Naloxone is a medication designed to rapidly reverse opioid overdose. It is an opioid antagonist—meaning that it binds to opioid receptors and can reverse and block the effects of other opioids. It can very quickly restore normal respiration to a person whose breathing has slowed or stopped as a result of overdosing with heroin or prescription opioid pain medications. 

Find out more here.

One area of substance misuse among adolescents that is currently a problem, and has not been fully understood in the Nigerian context is the attitudes of adolescents towards cough syrup abuse. Thus, to inform policy actions for reducing cough syrup abuse among Nigerian adolescents, this study explored the attitudes of adolescents towards cough syrup abuse in two Southwest states of Nigeria, where substance abuse is rampant.

By a stratified sampling method, 302 adolescents (152 males, 150 females; mean age = 13.61 years, SD = 2.09) were selected from secondary schools in Lagos and Oyo states...

Abstract

Importance: Nonmedical prescription opioid use is a pressing public health issue in the United States. Transgender youth, including adolescent girls and young women who were assigned male at birth and currently identify as women, female, transgender women, or another diverse gender identity along the transfeminine gender spectrum, are more likely than their cisgender peers to report illicit substance use and meet diagnostic criteria for substance use disorders. However, relatively little is known about the experiences of these populations in the current era of opioid addiction and...