What is prevention?

The Alcohol and Drug Foundation’s mission is to inspire positive change and deliver evidence-based approaches to minimise alcohol and drug harm.

Preventative health initiatives work to achieve this goal and can fall under three categories; primary, secondary and tertiary prevention.

Primary Prevention

The goal of primary prevention is to address the causes of alcohol and other drug use to protect people from developing a dependency in the first place.

We know a sense of disconnection, unemployment, abuse or trauma, poor mental health, or a feeling of having no clear future – combined with availability and peer use of drugs – are strong risk factors for harm due to alcohol and other drug use.

We also know that the development of recreational pursuits, positive relationships with parents, family members and other role models, being engaged in a school or community environment, and spiritual beliefs can all help to limit or minimise exposure to risky behaviour around alcohol and other drugs.

With this in mind, we work to build safe, healthy and resilient communities with low prevalence of these risk factors and high prevalence of protective factors.

Secondary Prevention

Secondary prevention promotes safety for those who already use alcohol and other drugs and is directed towards people who have a higher or specific risk of serious harms. For ADF this includes initiatives like pill testing at music festivals, or live monitoring of pharmaceutical drug prescriptions.

Tertiary prevention

The goal of tertiary prevention is to help people with an existing disease, disability or medical condition to overcome it, or to improve their quality of life. For ADF this might include referring people to treatment providers, advocating for drug consumption rooms to reduce the risks of use, or distribution of anti-overdose medications like naloxone.