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A EUROPE-WIDE research programme that measures drug use based on the analysis of wastewater has thrown up some interesting discoveries.
The analysis was carried out on wastewater from 50 cities each over the course of March of this year.
The cities ranged from as northwestern as Reykjavik in Iceland to as southeastern as Nicosia in Cyprus. No Irish cities were monitored as part of the study.
It found a wide variance in the different types of drugs being used in different parts of Europe and observed the dramatic spike in the use of some drugs that occurs at the weekend.
The wastewater analysis was carried out the main EU drugs agency and revealed a number of interesting trends:
Weekend
The study was conducted over the course of March 2016 and also monitored the average daily drug use over each of the seven days of the week. The results found that the use of cocaine and MDMA rose sharply at weekends in most cities, while methamphetamine use was more evenly distributed throughout the week.
Below is the daily trend of the five cities that had the greatest concentration of cocaine or cocaine metabolites in the sewer system.
The cities are Antwerp in green, Zurich in black, Barcelona in blue, London in orange, and Monlina de Sugara (Spain) in turquoise.
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well done to Conor Niland and shamrock rovers, keep it going.
Two trade unions representing firefighters and paramedics from Dublin Fire Brigade are to go to the Labour Relations Commission in a dispute over overtime, training and annual leave. If unresolved, the dispute could lead to strike action.
Jeez ,If they don’t get their own way they’ll be out driving their taxis more than ever !!
That is a deadly pic of the library. Very hard to pick a book though!
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