A new study based on the Finnish Master thesis says that Internet addiction can easily develop to people who have hard time establishing real life social relationships and are perhaps suffering from depression.

The study is based on almost nine thousand participants, and it was made as an online survey. It is estimated that currently about three to four percent of Internet users in Finland are seriously addicted.

About fourteen percent of Finnish online computer users suffer from some degree of Internet addiction. If you want to review your Internet use you can take an Internet Addiction Test at Center for Internet Addiction Recovery’s pages here

Judge Peter Moss has given a hard criticism against the drug rehabilitation for criminal offenders. He is stating that less than half of the offenders complete the courses they are given, and can’t think of almost any drug rehab programs that have been successful for them.

Moss has a suggestion that he thinks would be the best for addicted criminals. That would be a abstinence-based rehabilitation. “The most appropriate way to deal with drug addicted criminals is to provide robust, abstinence-based rehabilitation which we know is most effective.”

Although he criticizes the current rehab system, he has been giving sentences considering this option. He tells this group of offenders is hard to work with, but the number of offenders who completes the rehab has risen from 28% to 43% in five years.

Gambling addiction can be a strain for relationships and interfere with responsibilities at home and work. After all it most probably leads to a financial catastrophe. After online gambling was introduced the problem of gambling addiction has risen remarkably.

Recently the government of an European country, Norway, has passed a bill for banning online gambling due to excessive amount of addicts. This would mean that all the financial transactions to and from online gambling sites would be denied.

Studies in Norway have shown that the introduction of slots machines have led to an increase in gambling addiction. This has led the politicians to take the anti-gambling approach as a sure vote-winner. This week Parliament passed the bill to forbid companies to operate online gambling websites in Norway.

Colleges have started to ban energy drinks which contain large amounts of caffeine due to exessive use of students. Recently the college of West Anglia has removed energy drinks from their shops and vending machines.

The popularity of energy drinks such as Red Bull or Relentless has risen exploding during students who use them to boost alertness after a long nights of studying or partying. Some youngsters however have started to use them exessively, and replaced their breakfast with a caffeinated sugar drink.

In some cases the tutors have complained the students becoming hyperactive during lessons after having energy drinks. Health experts have been warning for the high caffeinated drinks because they can cause addiction, chest pains and heart palpitations especially in teenage users.

In a recently released survey it is found out that teens are abusing prescription medication more than any other drug. The report states that even younger children are usign prescriptions drugs to “get high” or to “self-medicate.”

Rowan-Salisbury School System reports they are finding an increasing amount of students, misusing and selling prescription medication to their friends. This is told to be happening on a regular basis and in all social, economic, geographic and ethnic groups.

The reason why students are choosing prescription drugs is because they are more easily available, often stolen from home. Many times it is also thought prescripted drugs are safer than illegal drugs found from the streets. Some students use online pharmacies to buy the drugs.

Russia’s drug control authority reports that the amount of drug addictions is currently almost ten times greater than in 1990. The large amount of drug addictions have significant impact on the country’s economy.

“Drug addiction costs the Russian economy around 1.5 trillion rubles ($54 billion) each year, or 2.5 percent of the country’s gross domestic product, Victor Ivanov, head of Drug control Service said.”

Up to thirty thousand people die each year because of drug-related complications. This may be due to the fact, that Afghanistan’s drug production has increased 44 times since ISAF (International Security Assistance Force) was deployed in the country.

As the World AIDS Day is almost here, Human Rights Watch says governments around the world should adopt and expand needle and syringe exchange programs as well as effective drug dependency treatment to reduce HIV among people.

“HIV epidemics around the world are being driven by lack of access to needle exchange programs and methadone-maintenance treatment, both proven to reduce drug use. We’ve known for decades that these approaches work, but many governments and international donors either provide too little support or refuse to try them.”

World AIDS Day is on December first, and it aims to stop HIV prejudice and stop the spread of HIV. World AIDS Day brings to people’s attention the worldwide challenges and consequences of the epidemic - ultimately halting the spread of HIV and improving the lives of people living with the virus.

A new recovery center is offering an advanced approach to treating alcohol and drug addiction. The new residential treatment approach includes behavioral/addiction diagnosis, neurotherapy, and medication therapies. In addition to these the clients will have support through an online e-learning program.

Enterhealth’s aim is to not only treat people who need help overcoming addiction, but to also inspire change in our industry toward more aggressive, advanced approaches and restore hope to those who are seeking a solution that will work today and for the remainder of their lives.

The new treatment program is personalized for each client, and it combines psychological, neurological, pharmacological, and technological methods to treat addiction, and continuous online support is part of the therapy. The recovery center will open its doors next week.

China has the worlds largest online community with 253 million users. Especially gaming in internet cafés has become extremely popular among young chinese men. Now China may become the first country in the world which classifies internet addiction as a clinical disorder.

Beijing’s Health Ministry is expected to adopt a new manual on internet addiction next year, based on the research of Chinese psychologists. It will recognise the condition as similar to compulsive gambling or alcoholism.

According to estimates, about 10% of young users suffer from addiction and of those more than two thirds are male. Chinese specialists say the condition is often a symptom of deeper psychological problems, and the behavioural problems of child addicts become aggravated by their addiction.

However, the specialist remind, unlike drugs internet addiction does not create physical dependency and thus the addicts can be cured in 70 per cent of times.

According to a new study long-term drug treatment gives the best results when treating young people with addiction to opioid prescription painkillers. The study focused on 152 oioid addicts between the ages of 15 to 21 for 12 weeks.

The first group took the drug Suboxone for a period of 9 weeks, and then stopped taking it after 12 weeks. The second group took a lower dose of the drug, for only a period of two weeks. After 8 weeks went by, only 23% of those on the drug had positive urine tests which showed they have been using again.

The leader of the study, Dr. George Woody of the University of Pennsylvania, states that currently majority of the treatment programs in the U.S. are on a short-term set-up. The problems these young people are facing are tried to be fixed over a short period of time through detoxification.