OUR NATION’S DEADLY DISGRACE

Drug deaths hit three a day – the highest toll in Europe

SCOTLAND has the highest rate of drug deaths in Europe after fatalities rose to record levels.

More than 1,200 people – at least three a day – died from drugs in 2019, including an average of one a day after taking cocaine.

The death rate is now nearly four times greater than the UK as a whole after an increase of 6 per cent in the past year.

There were also almost 800 deaths involving so- called legal highs, or New Psychoactive Substances (NPS), which mimic the effects of substances including cocaine and ecstasy.

Last night there was anger that drug deaths had risen again despite repeated Scottish Government pledges to tackle the problem.

Scottish Tory health spokesman Donald Cameron said: ‘These statistics are both dreadful and heartbreaking in equal measure. Every one of these deaths is a tragic loss of life that could have been avoided.

‘It is appalling that drug deaths have doubled in a decade and there’s no doubt that this Government’s cuts to drug rehab

‘It’s time to make way for fresh leadership’

and addiction programmes have a large part to play in this awful trend.’

United Nations drugs expert Dr Ian Oliver, a former Grampian Police chief constable, said: ‘This has been an enduring problem and I have not seen much evidence of a high-profile anti-drug policy – which must include a very longterm strategy of education, particularly of young people.

‘If that exists, it does not appear to be very effective.’

The National Records of Scotland figures for 2019 show a 6 per cent increase on 2018, when Scotland also recorded the highest rate across Europe, with drug deaths rising by 77 to 1,264.

Heroin and morphine were involved in more deaths – 645 – than in any previous year and were more than half of the total.

Methadone was involved in 560 fatalities, benzodiazepines of any form – street and prescription – in 999, and cocaine in 365, the highest number on record, up from 273 in 2018.

Twenty-seven per cent of the 365 cocaine deaths were of people aged 25-34, compared with 17 per cent of all drug-related deaths.

A total of 404 drug deaths were in the Greater Glasgow and Clyde health board area, 163 were in Lanarkshire, 155 in Lothian, 118 in Tayside and 108 in Ayrshire and Arran.

NPS were ‘ i mplicated i n, or potentially contributed to, the cause of’ 783 deaths.

The overall Scottish drug death figure of 231 per million of the population is almost 3.6 times the figure for the UK as a whole – 64 per million – while the EU average is only 24 per million.

Opposition politicians and charities said each death could have been prevented.

Scottish Labour health spokesman Monica Lennon called on Public Health Minister Joe FitzPatrick to step down in light of the new figures.

She said: ‘The public needs to have confidence in the public health minister to lead us out of this human rights tragedy. These shocking statistics and his woeful response give us none.

‘Joe FitzPatrick has tried his best but it’s not good enough.

‘It’s time to make way for fresh leadership.’

Miss Lennon’s call was echoed by party colleague Neil Findlay MSP, who said that First Minister Nicola Sturgeon’s decision to leave the Holyrood chamber before Mr FitzPatrick’s statement yesterday was a ‘disgrace’. Mr FitzPatrick said: ‘ Each and every one of these deaths is a tragedy and I would like to offer my condolences to the family, friends and loved ones of those who have lost their lives.

‘The Scottish Government is doing everything in its powers to tackle rising drug deaths and we are working urgently to put in place high-quality, person-centred services for those most at risk.’

He said steps taken by the Scottish Government and its partners include investing up to £93.5million this year to tackle problem alcohol and drug misuse.

Mr FitzPatrick said the drug deaths s t e mmed from ‘a long-standing and complex set of challenges’, and there was ‘no

‘Human rights tragedy’

shortcut that will suddenly solve this’.

He added: ‘There is, however, action that we are taking right now that will have an impact more immediately, such as maxi mising t he availability of naloxone [a heroin overdose treatment] and the routes by which it can be supplied.

‘Our work to introduce medication-assisted treatment standards is one of the most significant changes to the way in which treatment services operate. Furthermore, we have seen the introduction of a range of innovative approaches, including Scotland’s first heroin assisted treatment service in Glasgow.’

He said the Scottish Government will keep working with the Drug Deaths Taskforce and others to ‘identify and put in place measures to tackle this issue and save lives’. Mr FitzPatrick said he would continue to urge the UK Government to change the law to legalise supervised drug consumption facilities or devolve the necessary powers to Scotland, something which it has repeatedly ruled out.

In the Commons, Nationalist MP Alison Thewliss said: ‘We know we must do more, though we do this with our hands tied behind our back’.

IT is a source of enormous shame that Scotland’s drug death toll has risen yet again. At more than 1,200 a year, it is the highest in the UK – and the fatality rate is nearly four times greater than the figure for the UK as a whole.

And yet ministers can offer only platitudes and more of the same broken policies repeatedly proven not to work.

Nationalists have spoken up in favour of drug decriminalisation and ‘consumption rooms’, where addicts can inject in safety.

They also back soft-touch measures for possession of small amounts of cannabis, a gateway drug for far deadlier substances.

Ministers have been seduced by this liberal ideology while senior figures within policing talk of drug addiction as a health and not a justice matter.

In reality, as Dr Neil McKeganey writes on this page, police play a vital role in preventing drug abuse from overwhelming and destroying communities.

When the SNP came to power, it vowed to reduce reliance on methadone, which is responsible for nearly half of all drug deaths. Instead, spending on the heroin substitute soared, saddling us with a policy that has manifestly failed.

Yet ministers remain in thrall to the experts who advocate substitution over abstinence, or ‘cold turkey’ treatments.

Confronted year after year with these devastating statistics, they merely promise an endless repeat of tactics that have been shown to fail. But it will take more than platitudes – or blaming the UK Government – to address this appalling crisis.

Public Health Minister Joe FitzPatrick has failed to inspire confidence in his handling of the Covid vaccination drive – yet he is the minister spearheading the bid to cut drug fatalities.

The SNP Government must recognise that over the past 13 years, its every attempt to drive down the death toll has succeeded only in increasing it.

There must be an urgent overhaul of its dangerously flawed strategy – before more lives are needlessly lost.