Scotland’s drug deaths remain highest in Europe despite ‘worrying’ 12% rise

Scotland’s drug deaths remain the highest in Europe. Ministers have pledged to step up efforts to tackle the problem after a “deeply worrying” 12% rise in deaths last year.

Health Secretary Neil Gray said the Scottish Government was also “working hard to respond to the growing threat from highly dangerous, super-strong synthetic opioids such as nitazenes”, which have been involved in 23 deaths.

Figures released on Tuesday showed deaths have risen by 12%, with drugs claiming the lives of 1,172 Scots in 2023 – an increase of 121 on the previous year

Gray said: “My sincere condolences go out to everyone affected by the loss of a loved one to drugs.

“These deaths remain deeply concerning and underline why we will continue to do everything we can to reduce the harm and deaths caused by drugs.”

Organizations working with addiction patients said the “measurable shortcomings” underlying this ongoing public health emergency remained the same.

Austin Smith of the Scottish Drugs Forum said: “The big story is the old one, that not enough people are getting into treatment and that when they do they are not getting the comprehensive care they need to support them with the reasons why they self-medicated in the first place.”

Data from the National Records of Scotland showed that opioids, such as heroin and methadone, were involved in 80% of all drug-related deaths last year, with agencies warning against exaggerating concerns that new substances could be responsible for the rise.

Deaths involving bromazolam, a type of benzodiazepine used to treat anxiety, insomnia and seizures, rose to 426 last year from 54 in 2022, while deaths involving synthetic opioids known as nitasenes, which have flooded the U.S. market since the Taliban disrupted the global drug trade, rose to 23 in 12 months from just one. There was also a sharp rise in cocaine overdoses, with the drug a factor in 479 deaths in 2023, up from 371 deaths in 2022.

On Monday, the Scottish Drugs Forum published its own review of the treatments available across the country. The forum questioned why targets to improve services and increase the number of people in treatment had not been met, three years after then First Minister Nicola Sturgeon announced a “national mission” to tackle the country’s chronic and epidemic death rates.

The report found that Scotland has missed the target of a 9% increase in the number of people in treatment, which the Scottish Government set in March 2022 for April 2024. The Medication Assisted Treatment Standards, introduced in May 2021, which are designed to make services more accessible, have also not yet been fully implemented.

Smith said: “We are failing to create therapeutic relationships with people. We can go into the details of prescribing and dosing, but this should be about empowerment and helping people with whatever is going on in their lives, rather than feeling ‘parked on methadone’, which is what many people in the report still described.”

Gray said his administration “will intensify our efforts and is also working hard to respond to the growing threat of highly dangerous, super-strong synthetic opioids.”

He added: “We are taking a wide range of actions through our £250 million national mission on drugs, including opening a safer drug use pilot facility, working to open drug testing facilities and widening access to life-saving naloxone.”