A drug and alcohol misuse service has supported more than 220 children and young people across Lincolnshire last year, new figures have revealed.
Lincolnshire County Council developed a drug and alcohol misuse service in 2021 after being granted powers by Government, writes Local Democracy Reporter Oliver Castle.
Members of Lincolnshire County Council’s adult social care and public health scrutiny committee heard that the service has supported 3,538 adults and 229 children and young people to access treatment in the 2024-25 financial year.
Lucy Gavens, Public Health consultant at the county council, said: “Alcohol and drug use can have significant impacts both on individuals that use the substances, their family and friends, their local community and also the wider economy.
“So there are lots of reasons why it’s important to us to prevent alcohol-harm and drug related harm.”
Ms Gavens told councillors the service is working with local organisations to provide treatment for people suffering from drug and alcohol addictions.
She said: “We also reach out into our injecting drug use population through our needle and syringe programme which delivered just shy of 2,500 harm reduction sessions.
“In terms of the stay safe programme, we worked with just over 15,000 children to help them understand the harms of drug and alcohol use. Our family support service has worked with 234 people who are friends and family of people who are using drugs and alcohol.”
Ms Gavens said the service is investing £9.8 million this financial year to tackle drug and alcohol misuse across Lincolnshire – funded by a public health grant and several regional and national supplement grants.
She added: “We do work very closely with partners across the health and social care system as well as the criminal justice system.
“We work closely with the police, probation, with the prisons and have several programmes for what we call diversion from custody into treatment.”
“For example, if someone has committed an offence, where perhaps it’s a first time offence and where drug or alcohol abuse has been identified as a factor as to what’s led to that behaviour.”
