OUR LOST DAUGHTERS
Experts reveal more women are losing lives to drugs
They feel guilty and struggle on alone
Record numbers of Scots women are dying from drugs overdoses, prompting calls for dedicated help for female addicts.
Women now account for nearly a third of drugs deaths in Scotland when a decade ago they made up less than a fifth.
Official figures show 934 Scots died of overdoses in 2017, 282 of who were women.
But the number of deaths last year is expected to be far greater, with one expert predicting as many as 1,200 drugs victims.
Experts want more facilities specifically for women addicts, and more research to give a better understanding of why women are apparently becoming more vulnerable to addiction and overdose.
Professor Catriona Matheson, co-author of a Scottish Government report into rising overdose deaths in woman, said women are less likely to seek help for addiction because they feel socially isolated, stigmatised and guilty.
She said: “Some feel they will be harshly judged if they seek treatment because they are women.
“They are struggling under the burden of trying to keep their children.
“They are vulnerable people, stigmatised and don’t want to seek help. They feel guilty and struggle on, trying to cope themselves.”
Professor Matheson worked as a community pharmacist before moving into academic research.
“I have been aware of the guilt and treatment of addicts since I first did work placements in a local pharmacy in a Glasgow housing scheme as a teenager,” she added.
She said that many of those who die are long-term drug users who managed to hide the extent of their problem.
“We are talking about women in their forties and fifties – mothers, grandmothers, sisters and women who are often the mainstay of families.
“Their bodies – livers – have been compromised by years of drug abuse, often hidden.”
Now they are encountering new, stronger drugs, and their bodies cannot cope.
These include the synthetic opioid fentanyl, used as a heroin substitute but far stronger and much more deadly, and etizolam, also known as “street valium”.
Professor Matheson said “Women’s weight and gender may be causing them to overdose. Their livers and kidneys are smaller. That and the fact that they may not have been eating properly.
“We need to carry out research that will tell us how to intervene sooner if we want to stop increasing numbers of women dying.
“We also need support centres that will be women-friendly.
“Without this and the vital research needed to help women, we can only expect to see the numbers of women dying rise.”
The need to act swiftly is echoed by Ian Hamilton, associate professor of addiction at York University.
He said the majority of research into support for those with drug problems was carried out in men.
Ian, a Scot who spent 20 years as a mental health nurse, said: “What we know is that women are more likely to accelerate from, say, smoking cannabis
to injecting or taking harder drugs. It is called telescoping.
“The pressures of life weigh more heavily on women – children, abusive partners, poverty in families and cutbacks in welfare.
“They do not access treatment in the way men do. We desperately need womenonly support and treatment centres where they know they will not lose their children if they admit a drug problem.
“They need to have creches and be easy to reach. We know that women are less likely to seek health care because they can be stretched to the limit, holding down two or three jobs, looking after kids and even elderly parents.
“They access the drugs by online shopping. Drugs like fentanyl can be accessed online, as can virtually any drug. Savage cuts to treatment means support has become even less likely.
“We need to start looking at drugs as a health problem and not a criminal one, and provide adequate support and treatment.
“Countries like Portugal have done this successfully and cut deaths.”
David Liddell, chief executive of the Scottish Drugs Forum, said: “Scotland has the worst drug-related deaths figures in Europe per head of population.
“There is strong evidence that high- quality treatment protects people against drug- related deaths. Sadly, in Scotland we only have 40% of people in treatment.
“Other countries, including England, have lower rates of drug- related deaths and a higher proportion of people in treatment.
“For example, the figure for England is 60%.
“This lower rate must be because of the way we deliver treatment services.
“People die from using more than one substance at a time. The vast majority of deaths involve heroin and other depressant drugs.
“We have seen, however, increases in the use of tranquillisers – benzodiazepines primarily from illegal supply.
“We have seen a significant increase in those aged over 35 dying of an overdose this is likely to be around three- quarters of those who died last year – roughly 1,100 people.”