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Alcohol and Other Drugs

We conduct leading research on alcohol and other drug dependence, working with at-risk populations including people who are drug dependent and people who inject drugs.

Group Heads

About

In Australia, alcohol and other drug dependence is a major issue. According to Rethink Addiction (2022), it contributes to health and social harms that cost the Australian community approximately $35 billion a year.

Burnet has a well-established reputation working with communities to reduce alcohol and other drug-related harms. This includes at-risk populations such as:

people who are drug dependent
people without stable housing
people who inject drugs.

Our work uses innovative research designs and methods including:

cross-sectional surveys
population surveys
longitudinal cohort data linkage studies

We also collaborate with researchers from key national and international institutions.

Our aims are to:

document the trajectories of alcohol and other drug use
document key intervention points to reduce harms
develop innovative studies to better understand
- patterns of alcohol and other drug use
- related harms in the community
develop, implement and evaluate new interventions to reduce alcohol and other drug-related harms.

Key achievement

The National Health and Medical Research Council has awarded $3.9 million to Burnet Institute. The funding is to establish a cohort of people who inject drugs and use the North Richmond Medically Supervised Injecting Room (MSIR). With their consent, the cohort will be followed through record linkage to administrative (e.g. health and housing) data.

The program brings together partners from nationwide research institutes, universities and community-based organisations.

News and features

View 8 more

Australia faces rising threats from synthetic opioids

Dorabjee Award recipients driving change through harm reduction

Recommendations released for use of opioid agonist treatment in prisons

View 8 more

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Sexual Health And Sexually Transmissible Infections Among People Who Use Drugs Edit

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Featured publications

01 Feb 2025

Supervised Injecting Room Cohort Study (SIRX): study protocol

BMJ Open

Dylan Vella-Horne, Ashleigh C. Stewart, Matthew Hickman, Paul A. Agius, Nick Scott, Amanda Roxburgh, Daniel O’Keefe, Peter Higgs, Mark Stoové, Zachary Lloyd

13 Aug 2024

20-year trends in Australian methamphetamine-related deaths, 2001–2020

International Journal of Drug Policy

Oisin Stronach, Paul Dietze, Michael Livingston, Amanda Roxburgh, Oisin Stronach, Paul Dietze, Michael Livingston, Amanda Roxburgh

20 Oct 2021

Cohort Profile: The Melbourne Injecting Drug User Cohort Study (SuperMIX)

International Journal of Epidemiology

Daniel O’Keefe, Wijnand van den Boom, Maria del Mar Quiroga, Dhanya Kumar, Penny Hill, Nick Scott, Paul A. Agius, Peter Higgs, Lisa Maher, Matthew Hickman

15 Nov 2024

Anxiety and depression among a community‐recruited cohort of people who use methamphetamine: A longitudinal analysis

Addiction

Keith Sutton, Bernadette Ward, Kasun Rathnayake, Brendan Quinn, Paul Dietze

23 Jan 2025

Disproportionate, differential and targeted treatment: people who use drugs’ experiences of policing during the COVID-19 pandemic

Health & Justice

Kasun Rathnayake, Shelley Walker, Paul Dietze, Peter Higgs, Bernadette Ward, Margaret Hellard, Joseph Doyle, Mark Stoové, Lisa Maher, Shelley Walker

15 Mar 2023

The impacts of COVID‐19 measures on drug markets and drug use among a cohort of people who use methamphetamine in Victoria, Australia

Addiction

Kasun Rathnayake, Paul A. Agius, Bernadette Ward, Lisa Maher, Mark Stoové, Joseph Doyle, Margaret Hellard, Anna L. Wilkinson, Brendan Quinn, Keith Sutton

20 Sep 2022

Twenty-year trends in pharmaceutical fentanyl and illicit fentanyl deaths, Australia 2001–2021

International Journal of Drug Policy

Amanda Roxburgh, Suzanne Nielsen

02 Sep 2024

Changes in Australians' attitudes towards supervised injecting facilities

Drug and Alcohol Review

Zachary Lloyd, Samantha Colledge‐Frisby, Nicholas Taylor, Michael Livingston, Amanda Roxburgh

11 Nov 2020

A prospective cohort of people who use methamphetamine in Melbourne and non‐metropolitan Victoria, Australia: Baseline characteristics and correlates of methamphetamine dependence

Drug and Alcohol Review

Cristal Hall, Brendan Quinn, Bernadette Ward, Paul A. Agius, Rebecca Jenkinson, Keith Sutton, Reece Cossar, Paul Dietze, Brendan Quinn, Bernadette Ward

Group contacts

Health themes

Projects

Published research

Careers

Study at Burnet

About us

Where we work

Alcohol and Other Drugs

Group Heads

About

Key achievement

News and features

Australia faces rising threats from synthetic opioids

Dorabjee Award recipients driving change through harm reduction

Recommendations released for use of opioid agonist treatment in prisons

Tap an image to expand it in focused view

Featured publications

Supervised Injecting Room Cohort Study (SIRX): study protocol

20-year trends in Australian methamphetamine-related deaths, 2001–2020

Cohort Profile: The Melbourne Injecting Drug User Cohort Study (SuperMIX)

Anxiety and depression among a community‐recruited cohort of people who use methamphetamine: A longitudinal analysis

Disproportionate, differential and targeted treatment: people who use drugs’ experiences of policing during the COVID-19 pandemic

The impacts of COVID‐19 measures on drug markets and drug use among a cohort of people who use methamphetamine in Victoria, Australia

Twenty-year trends in pharmaceutical fentanyl and illicit fentanyl deaths, Australia 2001–2021

Changes in Australians' attitudes towards supervised injecting facilities

A prospective cohort of people who use methamphetamine in Melbourne and non‐metropolitan Victoria, Australia: Baseline characteristics and correlates of methamphetamine dependence

Group contacts

Professor Paul Dietze

Program Director, Disease Elimination; Professor and Program Leader, National Drug Research Institute (NDRI)

Student supervisor contacts

Dr Michael Curtis

Postdoctoral Research Officer

Dr Anna Wilkinson

Research Fellow

Associate Professor Peter Higgs

Principal Research Fellow; Honorary Associate Professor, Department of Public Health, La Trobe University

Dr Rebecca Winter

Deputy Head Justice Health Group

Professor Paul Dietze

Program Director, Disease Elimination; Professor and Program Leader, National Drug Research Institute (NDRI)

Dr Shelley Walker

Adjunct Research Fellow

Dr Amanda Roxburgh

Senior Research Fellow

Dr Rachel Sacks-Davis

Senior Research Fellow

Group members

Professor Paul Dietze

Program Director, Disease Elimination; Professor and Program Leader, National Drug Research Institute (NDRI)

Associate Professor Peter Higgs

Principal Research Fellow; Honorary Associate Professor, Department of Public Health, La Trobe University

Dr Amanda Roxburgh

Senior Research Fellow

Anja Busse

Honorary Senior Fellow

Ashleigh Stewart

Postdoctoral Research Fellow

Bianca Whiteside

PhD candidate; Research Assistant

Dr Caitlin Douglass

Senior Research Officer

Caitlin Caselli

Master’s Student

Dr Campbell Aitken

Research Fellow

Dr Danielle Horyniak

Honorary Staff member

Filip Djordjevic

Research Assistant

Dr Jocelyn Chan

Public Health Physician and Research Officer

Professor Margaret Hellard AM

Deputy Director, Programs; Adjunct Professor, Monash University, DEPM.

Professor Mark A Stoové

Head of Public Health

Dr Michael Curtis

Postdoctoral Research Officer

Dr Rebecca Winter

Deputy Head Justice Health Group

Rebekka (Bek) Petrovic