Preface

Prevention is a key consideration when discussing substance use and related problems. Drug prevention is any activity that delays or reduces the use of substances. Preventing substance use potentially makes other interventions, especially targeting treatment and harm reduction, unnecessary. Evaluation of the various interventions is essential to develop and improve existing approaches and to work towards creating a best practice in drug prevention.

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Preface

Prevention is a key consideration when discussing substance use and related problems. Drug prevention is any activity that delays or reduces the use of substances. Preventing substance use potentially makes other interventions, especially targeting treatment and harm reduction, unnecessary. Evaluation of the various interventions is essential to develop and improve existing approaches and to work towards creating a best practice in drug prevention.

The EMCDDA first published the Guidelines for the evaluation of drug prevention in 1998 to respond to a need expressed by professionals and policymakers to have a tool and stimulus to evaluate prevention interventions in Europe. These guidelines aimed to facilitate and encourage project leaders to evaluate their own interventions and to design them accordingly.

This second edition is an updated version of the original EMCDDA guidelines, which contains new methods, concepts and examples of currently available drug prevention interventions and which provides a framework for carrying out an evaluation. The content has also been updated with developments in online EMCDDA drug prevention and evaluation resources.

Since publication of the first edition, prevention professionals who continue to apply these guidelines have contributed to the increased attention given to evaluation and prevention. However, although guidance on drug prevention is available in some Member States, only a minority of interventions in the European Union have an outcome evaluation. Even large, well-funded projects are still not fully evaluated and the availability of empirical evidence concerning prevention is weak.

These guidelines are intended for professionals working in the drug prevention and evaluation field and can provide valuable guidance when planning and evaluating prevention activities. The intention to develop best practice in drug prevention, as expressed in the 2005–8 and 2009–12 EU drugs action plans, and the fact that evaluation is now widely used in Member States’ drug policy, testify to the importance placed on drug prevention and evaluation in the European Union.

The aim of this publication is to raise the profile of both drug prevention and evaluation methodologies and to provide prevention practitioners with an up-to-date framework, to enable their interventions and evaluations to reach their full potential.

Wolfgang Götz

Director, EMCDDA