Improving Community Health and Prevention through the Preventing Drug Abuse and Excessive Alcohol Use Priority Area

This session will focus on the National Prevention Strategy (NPS) Priority Area of preventing drug abuse and excessive alcohol use. Key recommendations from the NPS for preventing drug abuse and excessive alcohol use are:
1) Supporting state, tribal, local, and territorial implementation and enforcement of alcohol policies,
2) Creating environments that empower young people not to drink or use other drugs,
3) Identify alcohol and other drug disorders early and provide brief intervention, referral and treatment, and
4) Reduce inappropriate access to and use of prescription drugs.

Many communities have been organizing to address this priority area. Synthesizing best practices within and across community contexts would be helpful to advance research and practice. In this session, we will carry out an active, participant engaged discussion of focused topics that will inform the NPS leadership of possible areas for technical assistance resource development and shared learning. The focused topics for discussion are: (a) Building partnerships across sectors and diverse contexts (b) finding common ground, decision-making and power sharing (c) policy development at the local level (upstream and downstream issues and ripple effects) and (d) enhancing capacities, mutual learning and sustainability. A brief summary of our shared understanding and common concerns will be reported back to the larger session for a response and future action from the national NPS leadership.