No time to be passive – let’s mobilise
This month we have strong and interesting articles on women’s services and housing/resettlement and it’s really heartening to hear of the great work going on across the country – with added inspiration from Australia on a thriving therapeutic community. Our contributions are evidence of a dynamic workforce making ‘hard to reach’ an irrelevant term.
We’re also grateful to be able to share valuable insight into suicide prevention from a partnership that’s been researching the complex link between alcohol and suicide (p16). This piece of work, with participation by people with lived experience of suicidal thoughts, can help us repair and improve the support pathway significantly.
But there are two overriding themes to stop you in your tracks wherever you work and whatever your role: alcohol deaths are the highest on record at more than 10,000 a year in the UK (p4); and the flood of synthetic drugs is fast turning into a public health emergency for which we are woefully ill-prepared (p14). We need to do things differently so let’s not be passive about this. Please send your thoughts for publication – and come along to the DDN conference to work out how we can mobilise, effectively, together.
Read the May issue as an online magazine (you can also download it as a PDF from the online magazine)
Claire Brown, editor
Please send your letters and comment to claire@cjwellings.com