Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to review the research evidence on recent British trends in the use of heroin and/or crack-cocaine by young people in order to appraise the scale and nature of the contemporary health problem they pose. Design/methodology/approach: The approach consists of a narrative review of the main current data sources on…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to describe trends since 2000 in young people's use of illegal/illicit drugs in Britain, and to place these into a longer-term context alongside recent theorising on youthful drug taking. The implications for health educators are to be examined. Design/methodology/approach: A selective narrative review of…