Up to the minute data on local drug and alcohol misuse and the strategies in place to tackle these issues.
Contribute to a debate about the community impact of substance misuse and tell us how we can work better together to take appropriate action.
Minutes:
Karen Linaker introduced this theme Item on Drug and Alcohol Misuse in our community areas.
The Board received three presentations from key speakers.
Wiltshire Public Health
Kelly Fry from Public Health and Cllr Ben Anderson presented information on substance misuse, which it was explained was a subject that the agencies and government were interested in. The role of public health was to understand and identify trends and to work with key agencies and partners to consider a wide range of options to carry out services to the community.
Health Needs Assessment enabled services to be available based on needs. We have been focusing on Wiltshire need for substance misuse, and had looked at it from life course including pre-natal.
In South West Wiltshire, one in three adults was drinking too much. The recommended amount per week was 14 units with three alcohol free nights per week. It was reported that seven out of ten people who drank too much were not concerned.
An audit is carried out and the findings are used to understand what the concerns are and how they could be addressed. We look at our young people and work very closely with schools.
Our adult service provision is called IMPACT, and was run by Turning Point.
Our data come from three years of data collated from the A&E department from Salisbury District Hospital.
It showed that males were most prevalent, and most likely to be admitted to hospital. The information was based on residential post code. The range of issues could range from cirrhosis of the liver to a fall.
Substance misuse figures for 2013 – 2014 were shown in a table. There were very small numbers. Substance misuse impacts on a wide range of local priorities.
Wiltshire Police
Dave Hambley gave a presentation on County Lines. The term County Lines had derived from the media. It was a term that the media and the police used to label individuals who were gang affiliated, that travelled out of larger towns and cities to market towns to sell drugs. They come out of London as it is a congested market and dangerous. As well as London, gangs also come from Liverpool and Manchester. The Police aim to show them that we are not a target and they will get caught.
The way it works is they have burner phones, the drug dealer will keep himself sterile in London, running half a dozen phones, they will then direct the sale of drugs in other areas like market towns.
This is gang related, are the runners armed with knives and sometimes fire arms. There are running lines in Salisbury, where they are selling drugs to children.
It is recognised that sending a gangster down here would stick out as they look different. They exploit young children aged 10 to 12 years old, and they force them to conceal drugs internally. They know the young children do not stand out and will not be as easy to spot. The dealers are spending the money on music videos to promote themselves and are making millions of pounds.
Things to look out for with your young people are pockets full of cash, money that is unaccountable for, train tickets to London, things that ring alarm bells to you.
If you suspect anything suspicious, it needs to be reported back to us.
Turning Point
Senior Operations Manager Ben Judd, presented information on the commissioned drug and alcohol support service, which was available to over 18’s in Swindon and Wiltshire.
This integrated service had four key principles:
· Prevention
· Accessibility
· Collaboration
· Treatment
The service deals with 1600 clients across the whole area. Locally there was a hub in Salisbury. Ben does a lot of work out in the community promoting the service.
· Information advice and signposting available on the wellbeing cloud
· ‘Find out more’ modules – with associated risks and harms data
· Health fairs
· Social media campaigns.
· Links with Public Health campaigns like Dry January & Stoptober
· Social media – Facebook & Twitter accounts
· Hub based delivery
· Engagement & prevention team
· Community and satellite venues – church halls, Tesco community spaces etc
· Roving recovery vehicle – visits festivals, and offers a safe needle exchange
· Women focused days – our case load is around 60/40 male/female
· Creche facilities
· Online referrals
Collaborations - Working with a range of partners – specific to each area.
Treatment - CQC registered – working across the 5 key lines of enquiry. Combined psychosocial (PSI) with pharmacological. The development of a new PSI led by national team, in line with evidence and best practice.
In-service support through group work, leads and clinical psychology. Delivering clear, concise risk management and recovery planning to provide the right intervention at the right time for the right person.
Karen Linaker asked people to write down any questions for the speakers and Councillors. The actions would be taken through the community safety group, which was chaired by Cllr Jeans.
A round table discussion session then took place where people were asked to consider and make suggestions based on three questions:
1. South West Wiltshire’s Local Youth Network: “How do you think the misuse of drugs or alcohol within the home, impacts on children and young people when growing up?”
2. Wiltshire Council’s Public Health: “In your street, neighbourhood, community or village – are there people drinking more than you think is healthy and safe? Who?”
3. Cllr Deane for area board and local community: “What do you think the community can do to increase awareness about the effects of drugs and alcohol, and support those who are misusing them?”
Tables were asked to feedback two main points:
· Support isn’t necessarily always offered, or the right support at the right time to the right person. It can take time to pick things up and notice.
· With alcohol misuse it’s not always obvious, can be at home only.
· Very impactive and prevalent – issue around neglect of children and it has a huge impact on them, especially children with SEN.
· Isolation in village locations. Parents on their own. Children can become carers of adults with alcohol misuse or drugs. It can affect their childhood massively. Can be associated with domestic abuse.
· Sometimes we sanitise the message a little too much. We need to hit home with the truths about the dangers.
· It becomes the norm to some children, so unless we educate and support them they do not know it’s not the norm.
· In villages the streets are spread out in a lot of hamlets, some flood groups etc or working groups could be expanded to allow sharing of this information. Knowing where to get help and who to tell.
· People in pubs know the person next to them drink too much, how is that sign posted.
· Our Y7 and Y8 children see the older years smoking cannabis, so they may be feeling like it’s the norm and so when they get to Y9 they may feel pressured to do it.
· Impact on young people likely to increase, neglect, poor care, young people are drinking less as a result of adults poor behaviour.
· Drinking unsafely – not to use the term safe in the context of drinking alcohol
· Lack of other activities to be involved in – more provision of activities
· More information – the stats around hospital admissions etc we needed more, what the admissions were for, repeated admissions, the time of day, what for, more informed data.
· Young people drinking less, this is because they are using more dugs, due to the cost of alcohol, its taxed and so more expensive than buying drugs.
· Does national policy need to be changed around drugs – decriminalising? There has been some success with alcohol but with drugs there may be some ways to change things with education
· Education is key from an early age. Those who are excluded from school may be easier targets to this line of lifestyle, county lines and drug and alcohol misuse.
The Community Safety Group would take these points and actions forward.
Drugs and alcohol misuse will stay in the list of key issues.