Middle-class users fuel rise in cocaine deaths

Toll of victims increases seven-fold in a decade, while fatalities from all drugs hit record high

COCAINE deaths have risen sevenfold in a decade with middle-class drug users fuelling the crisis, official figures show.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) published data yesterday showing that drug-related deaths in England and Wales have reached a record high.

There were 4,859 deaths related to drug poisoning registered in 2021 – a rate of 84.4 deaths per million people.

This marks the ninth consecutive annual rise, up 6.2 per cent from the previous year. It is the highest number since records began in 1993.

The figures were revealed as the Government was accused by one of its own drugs advisers of not caring about the growing number of heroin addicts dying from overdoses.

The ONS also reported that there were 840 deaths involving cocaine registered in 2021, 8.1 per cent higher than the previous year (777 deaths) and more than seven times higher than in 2011 (112 deaths). Males accounted for 76.8 per cent of deaths involving cocaine (645 men compared with 195 women).

It has consistently been the second most used drug, after cannabis, in England and Wales in the past decade.

Experts said the overall rising trend in drug deaths in the past decade has been driven primarily by opiates, but fatalities involving other substances such as cocaine and “street Valium” had seen “significant” rises over the last 12 months.

ONS experts say the rising death toll linked to cocaine is likely a direct consequence of its rising use, fuelled by what experts claim is increasing popularity of the drug among the middle classes. Clinicians from the Priory, a UK mental health and addiction service, suggested they had seen a rise in middle-class people and homeworkers seeking help for cocaine addiction.

A spokesman said that inquiries about cocaine addiction are up 58 per cent compared with 12 months ago.

Dr Niall Campbell, consultant psychiatrist at the Priory’s Roehampton Hospital in London, said the rise in working from home had given people more opportunity to take drugs like cocaine.

“Without the need to go into the office, or attend meetings in person, people prone to cocaine and other addictions find more opportunities to continue them,” he said.

“It has not been easy for people to suddenly spend a lot of time at home, and the effect on personal relationships has been acute.”

“Previously people would use cocaine on the weekends, recreationally, but it has now shifted to daily use,” he told Mailonline. “Like anything that gets cheaper and more available, it’s used by more and more people. It has become more normalised.”

Drug support charities have issued multiple warnings to heroin users of an increasingly high risk of death. Batches of the class-a drug are suspected to have been mixed with synthetic opioids such as fentanyl.

When asked if anyone cared about the rising number of heroin-related deaths, Dr Emily Finch, a senior member of the Royal College of Psychiatrists who sits on the government’s advisory council on the misuse of drugs, told Sky News: “I don’t think, generally speaking, the general population do.

“I think many people, and perhaps that’s reflected in the Government, don’t care much and that is why they have allowed a treatment system to largely atrophy.”

A government spokesman said: “Our landmark drug strategy will help rebuild drug treatment and recovery services to better support people through recovery, as well as tackling the criminal supply chains which fuel illegal drug markets.”