The DrugScope report: ‘Young people’s drug and alcohol treatment at the crossroads’ is a valuable addition to the current debate about the range, context and delivery of specialist drug and alcohol interventions for young people, and raises astute questions about the way forward.
NTA young people’s lead Lynn Bransby was pleased to join Martin Barnes (DrugScope), David Chater (DCSF) and Christian Guy (Centre for Social Justice) as a speaker at the launch of the report.
Since the NTA took on responsibility for the delivery of young people’s specialist drug and alcohol interventions, there has been significant progress towards better integration of substance misuse services into the wider Children and Young People planning at a local level. As the DrugScope report says, very few young people develop dependency and those who use drugs and /or alcohol are likely to be vulnerable, experiencing a range of problems, of which substance misuse is one.
DrugScope and the NTA agree that it is important that all the needs of a vulnerable young person need to be met rather than addressing substance misuse in isolation.
In particular, the NTA would like to make the following points to address key issues raised by the DrugScope report:
An argument for the provision of services specifically for 16-25 age group is made in this report but it is by no means clear that this should be the policy response. As demonstrated in the recent NTA report: ‘Powder Cocaine: How the treatment system is responding to a growing problem’ effective treatment is available to those who use stimulants as well as opiates and increasingly all treatment services are able to treat the person rather than the drug.
The NTA agrees that young people’s services should not be judged by the same targets as adult services. It is not an expectation that young people are retained in treatment for 12 weeks unless they are part of the small proportion who are Problem Drug Users (defined as using heroin and/or crack). The vast majority of young people will need shorter periods in treatment as their problems are not entrenched.
DrugScope raise a question about the rise in young people in treatment when the numbers of young adults is falling. There is a difference in thresholds for entering treatment between the young people and the adult systems. Many of the young people entering treatment are beginning to use cannabis and alcohol problematically and the aim of treatment is to stop it becoming habitual and more damaging. The majority of adults in treatment require structured treatment to address addiction. The numbers of under 18’s in treatment cannot be compared to the numbers of adults in treatment.
Over the next year, the NTA will continue to prioritise the needs of young people, including focussing on pathways in and out of treatment, and monitoring the experiences of young people on the threshold of adulthood.