Stephen Husbands

Very proud to be part of the Harm Reduction team at the University of Bath and have our work recognised by the Royal Society of Chemistry
www.rsc.org/standards-an...

Disposable vapes ban: What you need to know as changes come into effect The government is banning the sale of single-use disposable vapes in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland

We @libdems.org.uk have long called for the government to tackle the alarming rise in vaping among young people.

While this is a positive step, far more must be done to tackle harmful spice spiked vapes, which are almost all refillable, as research by @uniofbath.bsky.social has revealed.

Sign the Petition The government must provide an emergency fund for families waiting for the ASGSF

chng.it/jcjvM6kXQT

Field-Portable Device for Detection of Controlled and Psychoactive Substances from e-Cigarettes Synthetic cannabinoids (SCs) are novel psychoactive substances (NPS) that are highly potent and associated with a range of severe toxicities. SC use, which is common in UK prisons and homeless communi...

Difficult to give timely harm reduction advice if you don't know what you are dealing with. This will help:
pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/...

Boat in evening grey light at La Taudiere

Cold, damp but rather beautiful day on the banks of the Loire. At La Taudiere

Amusing horse in background of painting in Chateau de Serrant

Visited the wonderful Chateau de Serrant (Loire) today. They even let the dog inside 🙂 Not sure exactly why, but this horse made me laugh

Pigeons, some roosting, others blurred in flight

Some wildlife photography in Saint Florent le Vieil, under a bridge over the Loire

Evening sun reflection in campervan window

La Cote Sauvage Comite

Found some sun (and wind) on La Côte Sauvage Comite

Mont Saint Michel

Campervan and Mont Saint Michel at night

Golden retriever and Mont Saint Michel

Wind and rain due, so probably time to move on from Normandy

Mont St Michel partly hidden by a flock of birds

Looking out from Mont St Michel at dusk

Classic view of Mont St Michel at dusk

Campervan overlooking Mont St Michel

Nice spot for the night, overlooking Mont St Michel

Eglise Saint Jacques

Nightime, Saint-James, Northern France

Pont de Normandie

Through the tunnel and heading west. Parked up in Saint-James for the night

Looking over the city of Bath, UK in the morning light

Lovely clear air over Bath after the storm.

Fentanyl deaths are falling. What’s behind the decline? The evidence points to changes in the drug supply

www.ft.com/content/6b19...
Good to see opioid deaths in the US falling, even if it's not clear why,....

Early morning light over the city of Bath on a frosty morning

Enjoyed the walk up to the University of Bath today.

Dutch police find 2kg gnome made of MDMA during drug bust Police say they tested the gnome after finding it among suspected narcotics.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
They do say gnomes possess magical powers,.....

Instant Detection of Synthetic Cannabinoids on Physical Matrices, Implemented on a Low-Cost, Ultraportable Device Synthetic cannabinoids (SCs) make up a class of novel psychoactive substances (NPS), used predominantly in prisons and homeless communities in the U.K. SCs can have severe side effects, including psychosis, stroke, and seizures, with numerous reported deaths associated with their use. The chemical diversity of SCs presents the major challenge to their detection since approaches relying on specific molecular recognition become outdated almost immediately. Ideally one would have a generic approach to detecting SCs in portable settings. The problem of SC detection is more challenging still because the majority of SCs enter the prison estate adsorbed onto physical matrices such as paper, fabric, or herb materials. That is, regardless of the detection modality used, the necessary extraction step reduces the effectiveness and ability to rapidly screen materials on-site. Herein, we demonstrate a truly instant generic test for SCs, tested against real-world drug seizures. The test is based on two advances. First, we identify a spectrally silent region in the emission spectrum of most physical matrices. Second, the finding that background signals (including from autofluorescence) can be accurately predicted is based on tracking the fraction of absorbed light from the irradiation source. Finally, we demonstrate that the intrinsic fluorescence of a large range of physical substrates can be leveraged to track the presence of other drugs of interest, including the most recent iterations of benzodiazepines and opioids. We demonstrate the implementation of our presumptive test in a portable, pocket-sized device that will find immediate utility in prisons and law enforcement agencies around the world.

The team here in Bath did an amazing job creating just such tech
pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10....

www.bath.ac.uk/announcement...

We've become really interested in vapes/vaping after finding such a high percentage of vapes confiscated in English schools had synthetic cannabinoids in them. Really easy to pick up with the right technology.

Golden retriever

Or just posing without the effort of the walk

Happy posing on a walk

Picture at Interlaken with dog sneaking into the corner

Sometimes he's the main element of the picture, and sometimes he's a more unexpected addition

Golden retriever in Peak District

It's the weekend, so a non work post of the dog, Dakin

Twitter is dead. Long live BlueSky. The exodus is real.

open.substack.com/pub/iandunt/...

Excellent. Harm reduction for social media.

There seems to be more K vapes around (I'm in the UK). Perhaps now using the free base? I can see that attempts to vape using standard salt forms wouldn't work well.

With lots of vapes from schools being found to contain synthetic cannabinoids and with some ketamine and MDMA turning up, how are vapes viewed in terms of #harmreduction ? Might attract more to using drugs, but perhaps safer with less chance of overdose??

Nitazenes: toxicologists warn of rise in overdoses linked to class of synthetic opioids Toxicologists have warned of a sharp rise in drug overdose deaths in England involving a group of potent synthetic opioids called nitazenes. Nitazenes have been found as contaminants in street heroin...

Bit surprised we haven't seen more 'pure' nitazenes in the UK
www.bmj.com/content/387/...

I'd also be interested in being on the harm reduction list if possible,...

Death in UK immigration removal centre is the first believed to be linked to the drug spice Staff at Brook House had warned it was ‘only a matter of time’ before someone died as a result of taking the drug

Better quality centres would help reduce drug use, but in the meantime better drug testing/checking
www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024...

Night shot over the city of Bath

Bath was looking dramatic the other night