Examination of three novel interventions to prevent driving under the influence of alcohol or illegal drugs, in which the police encourage relevant citizens to agree to be contacted by an alcohol/drug counsellor from their municipality.

Aim

The aim is to examine whether it is feasible to implement three novel prevention interventions into the workflow of the local police force and the municipality’s alcohol/drug treatment, in order to motivate relevant citizens to engage in substance use treatment and thereby reduce driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs (DUI).

Background

Police controls and sanctions, such as fines or driving license suspensions, have been the most important efforts to prevent DUI in Denmark. However, these efforts do not address potentially underlying substance use problems. National statistics on accidents show that many people charged with DUI of alcohol are stopped during the daytime and have a blood alcohol concentration above 0.12%, which indicates that these drivers may have serious alcohol problems. In Denmark, we also have short educational ANT courses (alcohol, drug and traffic course) that are mandatory for all having their driving license suspended. However, these courses do not address potentially underlying alcohol/drug problems, and it is doubtful that a mandatory course is sufficient to help a citizen with severe alcohol or drug problems. In addition, serious alcohol and drug problems are often linked to other social and psychological problems that maintain a cycle of problematic use.

The Study

We are examining three different prevention interventions, all of which aim to establish contact between relevant citizens and alcohol/drug counsellors from the local municipality. These interventions have not previously been employed in a national Danish context. The three interventions can be used in isolation or in combination and are termed: Charged, Citizen’s tip-off, and Recidivism.

1. The “Charged” intervention includes citizens being charged with DUI. In addition to the indictment, a police officer encourages the citizen to consent to be contacted by an alcohol/drug counsellor. If the person agrees, a counsellor from the citizen’s municipality then contacts him/her. This intervention is based on the Swedish intervention SMADIT, which has been implemented in Sweden since 2003.
2. The “Citizen’s tip-off” intervention includes citizens who have not yet been caught driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs, but are suspected based on tip-offs to the police from other citizens. A local police officer pays a visit to the relevant citizen and encourages him/her to consent to be contacted by an alcohol/drug counsellor. If the person agrees, a counsellor from the citizen’s municipality then contacts him/her. This intervention was developed by a local police officer on the small Danish island Bornholm and has been run as a pilot project on Bornholm, but without systematic evaluation.
3. The ”Recidivism” intervention includes citizens who have been charged with DUI at least once in the past 90 days and at least twice in the past five years. A local police officer pays a visit to the relevant citizen, and encourages him/her to consent to be contacted by an alcohol/drug counsellor. If the person agrees, a counsellor from the citizen’s municipality then contacts him/her. This intervention was developed in collaboration with the police in Northern Jutland, where local police officers called for alternative ways to deal with or help citizens who are repeatedly charged with DUI.

In all three sub-projects, we collect anonymous data from the police and municipalities. This enables us to examine how many people consent or not to be contacted by a counsellor, how many people initiate alcohol/drug treatment and how many complete the treatment. In addition, we interview police officers, counsellors, and citizens about their experiences with the three sub-projects and about potential factors that can facilitate or hinder the implementation.

The project is carried out between March 2020 and September 2022

Funding

The project is funded by a grant from TrygFonden

Collaborations

The project is carried out in collaboration with the Danish Safe Transport Council (Rådet for Sikker Trafik), the North Jutland Police, the Central and West Jutland Police and the North Zealand Police.