Methamphetamine use in Melbourne was increasing before the first lockdown in 2020 and decreased after it ended. During the second lockdown, methamphetamine trends remained steady before rising steeply after restrictions lifted. Cocaine use stayed steady for most of 2020 and increased after the second lockdown. MDMA use decreased after the first lockdown and remained low through 2020 and 2021. In 2021, stimulant use was less variable and less tied to COVID-19 restrictions than in 2020. The findings show how lockdown periods and social restrictions affected illicit stimulant consumption in one of the world's most locked-down cities.
During nonrapid eye movement (NREM) sleep, consciousness fades as the brain's dynamic functional connectivity changes. Using simultaneous EEG-fMRI recordings in 12 healthy men, the study examined two aspects of dynamic connectivity: mean (dFCmean), reflecting stable network integrity, and variance (dFCvar), indicating instability of information transfer. As sleep deepened, dFCmean decreased progressively across waking and NREM stages (N0~N1 > N2 > N3), while dFCvar peaked during N2 stage (N0~N1 < N3 < N2), suggesting unstable whole-brain synchronizations. In N3 stage, overall network integration was disrupted, with lowest dFCmean and elevated dFCvar. The findings suggest that consciousness dissipates when network specificity breaks down alongside increasing variability of information exchange.