South West Public Health Observatory
	The impact of drug misuse on health in the South West, 1996-2001

Acknowledgements

A Steering Group guided the project and consisted of:

• Tony Soteriou (Chair), Associate Research Director, AWP and Senior Research Fellow, UWE

• Barbara Boulton, Manager, South West National Drug Treatment Monitoring System (NDTMS)

• Judy Myles, Regional Adviser, Regional Drug Advisory Service (Lead Grant Holder)

• Andy Malinowski, Senior Lecturer, UWE

• Judy Orme, Principal Lecturer, UWE

• Janette Treagust, Senior Registrar in Public Health Medicine, SWPHO

• Iain Weir, Senior Lecturer in Statistics, UWE

• Stephen Wilkinson, Clinical Researcher, AWP

• Ian Sherwood of the Regional Drug Advisory Service, was involved in the early stages

• Colin Hassall, Coordinator, Gloucestershire Drug Action Team (DAT), joined the group at a later stage

Tackling drug misuse requires effective collaboration between numerous agencies, statutory and voluntary. Gathering information for this project relied heavily on the good auspices of these agencies and many individuals. We are very grateful to the following for their interest and help:

• Helen Cooke and Paul Brown, SWPHO

• John Hastings, NHS South West Regional Office

• Mike Shepherd and Claire Blinman, Public Health Department, Avon HA

• Gordon Hay, Centre for Drug Misuse Research, University of Glasgow

• Sam Wheeler, Information, South West Public Health Laboratory Service (PHLS)

• David Gunnell and Davidson Ho, Department of Social Medicine, University of Bristol

• National Project for Substance Abuse Deaths, St. George's Hospital

• Paul Faulkner, Department of Health (DH)

• Clare Griffiths, Office of National Statistics (ONS)

• Koye Balogan and Tom Paine, Communicable DiseasesSurveillance Centre (CDSC)

• Jane Wathen, Graphics, UWE

• Ian Clements and Ed Plowden, Drug Prevention AdvisoryService (DPAS)

• Graham Rogers and Martin McLean, Prison ServiceTeaching and Learning Support, UWE

• Richard Eliot and Becky Lovegrove, South West RegionDrug Services Audit Project

• South West Region DAT Co-ordinators

Thanks are due to the anonymous referees who providedhelpful comments.

The South West Multicentre Research Ethics Committeeapproved this project.

Contacts for correspondence :        s elena. g