Australia Archives - Page 112 of 112

Understanding the current escalating drug problem in Australia is complex. DARA has seen increasing number of clients coming from Queensland and other parts of Australia for our help. Here are some of the major reasons why:
10-Facts-About-Australias-Drug-Problem

Many states in Australia, such as Queensland, have relatively few residential treatment centers in comparison to the need.
Nearly all treatment centers have long waiting lists so that when someone is ready to ask for treatment for drug or alcohol problems, help may not be available during this critical window of opportunity.
Crystal meth use in Australia has doubled between 2010-2013, making the need for addiction treatment skyrocket, and the waiting lists even longer.
While $7billion is generated by alcohol related taxes each year in Australia, the costs for alcohol related treatment is over $15.3 billion.
The amount of oxycodone being prescribed by physicians in Australia has increased nine fold in the year 2009; problems with prescription painkiller dependence and addiction has also increased the need for effective treatment options.
In Australia, a private residential substance use rehab can have a monthly cost of between $15,000 and $135,000.
According to Brendan Post of the Queensland Network of Alcohol and Other Drug Services, there is interim help available for some outpatient services but are these stretched-thin due to the numbers of citizens who need treatment.
While outpatient services are at a later stage of recovery, individuals with a drug or alcohol addiction statistically do better when first receiving a more intensive and structured rehab program.
On a typical day in Australia, nearly 50,000 Australians are receiving medical-management of an addiction with suboxone, methadone, and other pharmacotherapy.
The culture of drug abuse in Australia stretches as far as the recently revealed issue in the Royal Australian Navy.

DARA encourages Australians to contact us. We are here to help you immediately. You’ll talk directly to a counselor, not an answering machine. You’ll learn how we can offer an all-inclusive residential program that is affordable to the average family. We are proud to offer an individualized program of care by an expert clinical team unmatched anywhere else in the world.

If you, or someone you care about, needs help for a drug or alcohol addiction,
contact us at 1-888-457-3518 US, 0-808-120-3633 UK or 1-800-990-523 AU.
We’re here to help you take that first important step.

Drinking games go back as far as ancient Greece and China. The games usually fall into one of a number of categories:

Speed—how much alcohol can be consumed in a certain period of time (includes games such as beer bong, flippy cup, shotgunning, and boat races)
Endurance—simple competitions to out-drink other players. Sometimes the goal is to see who can remain standing the longest (boot of beer, power hour, keg stand)
Skill—party and bar games that focus on an act of skill. In some games, the loser is required to drink a predetermined amount; in others, the winner (beer pong, beer darts, polish horseshoes, etc.)

There are also thinking games, cards, dice, and other competitions, all with alcohol involved.

All these can, as a group, range from the benign to the ridiculous. A friendly game of darts over beers can be innocent enough; competitive drinking for the sake of speed or volume can be dangerous, even lethal.

The latest and most alarming incarnation of the drinking game is Neknomination.

The point to this game is to chug beer or alcohol and video the event; then, the video is posted on social media and others are dared to outdo it and then post their performance, adding the same dare. This leads to a sort of networked, viral drinking competition where the only possible outcome is that one-upmanship drastically overrides common sense. In addition to just drinking, players have ramped up the competition by jumping off bridges, doing motorcycle stunts, and performing other risky acts.

Neknomination-related deaths have been reported in Australia, Ireland, and the UK.

One teen in Ireland died after drinking and jumping into a river, another after mixing white wine, vodka, whiskey, and beer. A ten-year-old boy in the UK became violently ill after participating in Neknomination.

This trend clearly requires a counterforce.