Summary - Department of Health and Ageing

Australia’s well-developed public health system focuses on priority areas identified as
having a significant impact on population health. Current national health priorities include
the following areas.
Cardiovascular health: tobacco and alcohol misuse are risk factors for cardiovascular
disease as well as other health problems; there have been successes in reducing adult,
but not adolescent, tobacco smoking. A recent initiative, the Smoking, Nutrition,
Alcohol and Physical activity Framework, directs the attention of general practitioners
to behavioural risk factor modification. Evaluations are not yet available.
Cancer prevention: this includes a number of policies and strategies relevant to drug
use, including reduction of tobacco and high-risk alcohol use. All initiatives
encouraging reductions in smoking or limiting drinking to within recommended
consumption guidelines can be considered cancer prevention initiatives.
Injury prevention: some interventions in this area are relevant to drug policy,
including reducing drink-driving and providing alcohol treatment services. Alcohol
causes, or contributes to, many injuries, including road trauma, falls, fire injury,
drowning, assault and suicide; dependence on alcohol dramatically increases the risk of
death through injury. Falls injuries in older people are especially associated with
problematic alcohol use. Other relevant injury prevention strategies include night
patrol schemes in Indigenous communities, enforcing responsible service legislation to
reduce alcohol-related injury; and more widespread use of brief interventions by
doctors to reduce problem drinking.
Many health education initiatives include information relevant to avoiding harmful drug
use. While it is a popular health promotion strategy, there is a body of evidence to show
that health education, as a stand-alone strategy, has only limited effects in changing
behaviour. Health education may have a role, however, as a component supporting a
broader set of behaviour change interventions.
Given the strong link between SES and health problems, including drug use, there is some
literature on attempting to reduce differentials in socioeconomic status. Structural and
legislative measures appear to be the most effective means of reducing health inequalities
but there is not yet sufficient evidence on which to base rational policy in this area. The
potential to reduce harmful drug use through these approaches is unclear.
A number of the strategies for promoting mental health are also relevant to the prevention
of drug-related harm. These include strategies to reduce social exclusion, alcohol and drug
problems, homelessness and unemployment; and strategies to increase or improve
parenting skills, social support networks, education and training opportunities, and healthy
work environments.
Mental health promotion and drug-related prevention rest on the same principle, that of
reducing risk factors and building protective factors. There is a strong theoretical case that
treating mental health problems is likely to be effective in reducing substance use, even in
the absence of treatment for substance use problems; but no direct evidence of this was
found. Nor is there direct evidence that mental health promotion programs reduce
substance use in the community, or that reductions in rates of mental health problems or
mental illness have a positive impact on rates of substance use problems. There is
increasing evidence that reducing drug use in youth may prevent mental health problems
later in life. This evidence suggests that mental health investment should form one
component in programs aiming to prevent early age or regular drug use in adolescence.