Vienna, Austria | AFP | The UN and Bogota signed a major pact Friday to uproot Colombia’s booming cocaine business, as part of ongoing peace efforts between the government and drug trade-controlling rebels. The deal worth $315 million dollars (270 million euros) aims to wean farmers off growing coca — …
Read More »Australia expands cashless welfare card to tackle alcohol, drugs
Sydney, Australia | AFP | Australia will expand the roll-out of cashless welfare cards after a pilot scheme showed a sharp drop in problem alcohol, drug and gambling abuse, the country’s prime minister said Friday. The government introduced the debit card — touted as a world-first — last year to two …
Read More »Five drugs found in Tiger Woods’ system after arrest
Los Angeles, United States | AFP | Tiger Woods had five drugs, including the opioid painkiller hydrocodone, in his system when he was arrested in May on suspicion of driving under the influence, according to a toxicology report released Monday. A urine test revealed four other medications along with hydrocodone …
Read More »‘El Chapo’ moves to hire top-flight NY mafia defender
New York, United States | AFP | Drug kingpin Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman wants to dump his US public defenders for a quartet of top-flight criminal defense lawyers, including attorneys who got an infamous New York mafia boss out of prison. Guzman, one of the world’s most notorious criminals who twice …
Read More »From poppy to heroin: Taliban move into Afghan drug production
Kabul, Afghanistan | AFP | The Taliban — which banned poppy cultivation when it ruled Afghanistan — now appears to wield significant control over the war-torn country’s heroin production line, providing insurgents with billions of dollars, officials have told AFP. In 2016 Afghanistan, which produces 80 percent of the world’s …
Read More »Finish your antibiotics course? Maybe not, experts say
Paris, France | AFP | British disease experts on Thursday suggested doing away with the “incorrect” advice to always finish a course of antibiotics, saying the approach was fuelling the spread of drug resistance. Rather than stopping antibiotics too early, the cause of resistance was “unnecessary” drug use, a team wrote …
Read More »Uruguayans registering to buy legal weed up almost 50% in a week
Montevideo, Uruguay | AFP | The number of people registering to buy newly legalized marijuana in Uruguay jumped by almost 50 percent in the first week of sales, according to official figures released Wednesday. The small South American country is the first in the world to legalize pot from production to …
Read More »US charges 412 including doctors, nurses, for health fraud and opioid scams
Washington, United States | AFP | US authorities announced charges Thursday against more than 400 people, many of them doctors and nurses, over health care scams worth $1.3 billion including the wrongful prescription and distribution of opioids. The Justice Department called it the largest ever enforcement action of its kind …
Read More »Australia cautiously enters medical marijuana market
Melbourne, Australia | AFP | At a secret location in Australia’s southeast, Peter Crook delicately tends to a two-month-old cannabis cutting. Barely knee high, it is one of about 50 government-sanctioned “mother plants” to be cloned for future generations of crops for the country’s fledgling medicinal marijuana industry. “I think we’ll …
Read More »Uganda increases tax on selected imported drugs
Kampala, Uganda| APA | Uganda government has increased tax levied on import of selected drugs including paracetamol, by pharmaceutical companies, from 2 percent to 12 percent. According to Uganda’s ministry of health the move which became effective August 1 , seeks to protect the locally made medicine from being out competed …
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