By Andrew Horne, Director, Addaction
THE time for wringing our hands is over. Scotland’s drug related deaths are at an all-time-high. We need solid action…and we need it now.
Our country has a serious drug death crisis; the worst in Europe, in fact. Every day at Addaction Scotland, we work with the people behind these numbers. Seeing individuals draw on strength they didn’t know they had and go on to make amazing recoveries from drugs and alcohol never ceases to amaze us. And on the flip side, the impact of a sudden death among our people never lessens.
Just last week, one of our long-term volunteers (who was previously supported by Addaction) died suddenly after a relapse. He was the life and soul of his local service, saying he was “delighted to be able to give something back to the community”. His passing has cast a shadow over everyone connected with the service. He is sorely missed and mourned but, in reality, he has become another drug-related death statistic.
At Addaction, Scotland’s biggest drug and alcohol charity, we feel deeply for family and friends when someone dies – but that is not enough. We need to take bold action and we need to take it now.
We suggest a five-point plan to be considered by the Scottish Government’s newly-formed drug death task force:
1, Adopt the Portuguese decriminalisation model. Portugal had a very similar problem to Scotland, with spiralling drug-related deaths. Its reaction? Treat drug-related offences as a health/social care issue, rather than crimes. Now, anyone coming to the attention of the police gets referred to treatment rather than caught in the revolving door of criminal justice. Portugal’s latest drug-related death figure was 34. When compared to the 1,187 who died last year in Scotland (a country half the size) Portugal’s success speaks for itself.
2, Make it compulsory for all first responders (like police, first aiders and paramedics) to carry Naloxone. This easy-to-use antidote for heroin overdose buys time to get to hospital and ultimately saves lives.
3, Establish drug consumption rooms. Safer injecting facilities get people off the streets and into safer environments, with medical staff who can teach reduction or get people engaged in local recovery services like Addaction’s. We need Westminster to allow Scotland to do this.
4, Put significantly more money into community-based treatment/recovery services. Addaction’s support staff will work with people on a 1-1 basis for as long as is needed, but charities like ours have limited resources. We want to reach more people and we need to do that now.
5, Get cross-party and First Minister support to tackle drug deaths. To change Scotland’s drug landscape, we all need to be on the same page. We want the Government to listen to support staff and the people they work with and treat drug-related deaths as the national emergency that it is. Scotland’s public places smoking ban was a resounding success and there’s now talk of eradicating tobacco in the years ahead. Drug deaths need to be seen as a similar priority.
Attitudes are gradually changing in Scotland. People are seeing that not only has the just-say-no approach failed, but that those who are dependent on drugs are often self-medicating. We don’t think twice when someone uses alcohol to unwind or be sociable, so who are we to judge the use of drugs to block out physical and emotional pain or childhood trauma? People don’t need exclusion, pity or a criminal record; they need genuine help. We hope that is exactly what the new drug death task force will bring to Scotland.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel