Drug-related deaths in Scotland in 2009

Main Points

The key points in this publication are:

On the basis of the definition used for these statistics, there were 545 drug-related deaths registered in Scotland in 2009, 29 (5 per cent) fewer than in 2008. However, this was the second-highest number ever recorded, 90 (20 per cent) more than in 2007 and 254 (87 per cent) more than in 1999. The number of drug-related deaths has risen in seven of the past ten years: the long-term trend appears to be upwards.
Males accounted for 76 per cent of the drug-related deaths in 2009.
In 2009, there were 189 drug-related deaths of people aged 35-44 (representing 35 per cent of all drug-related deaths) and 178 drug-related deaths of 25-34 year olds (33 per cent). In addition, 71 people aged under 25 died (13 per cent), as did 78 45-54 year olds (14 per cent) and 29 people aged 55 and over (5 per cent).
The Health Board areas which accounted for most of the 545 drug-related deaths in 2009 were:

Greater Glasgow & Clyde - 200 (37 per cent); and
Lothian - 81 (15 per cent).

Using the annual average for 2005-2009, to reduce the effect on the figures of year-to-year fluctuations:

for Scotland as a whole, the average of 466 drug-related deaths per year represented a death rate of 0.09 per 1,000 population;
only one Health Board area had a higher rate: Greater Glasgow & Clyde (0.14);
the next highest rate was for Tayside (0.09); and
five areas had rates of 0.08.

Comparing the annual average for 2005-2009 with that for 1996-2000:

the percentage increases in the number of drug-related deaths were about the same for males (80 per cent) and females (77 per cent);
the percentage increases for 35-44 year olds and people aged 45-54 were larger than for 25-34 year olds and people aged 55 and over, and there was a fall in the number of drug-related deaths of people aged under 25; and
the Health Board areas with the largest increases in the numbers of drug-related deaths were Greater Glasgow & Clyde (up by 52), Lanarkshire (up by 25), Lothian (up by 22) and Ayrshire & Arran (up by 21).

With effect from this publication, the General Register Office for Scotland (GROS)'s standard basis for the figures for individual drugs for 2008 and subsequent years is "drugs which were implicated in, or which potentially contributed to, the cause of death". Of the 545 drug-related deaths in 2009:

heroin and/or morphine were implicated in, or potentially contributed to, the cause of 322 deaths (59 per cent of the total);
methadone was implicated in, or potentially contributed to, 173 deaths (32 per cent);
benzodiazepines (e.g. diazepam) were implicated in, or potentially contributed to, 154 deaths (28 per cent);
cocaine, ecstasy and amphetamines were implicated in, or potentially contributed to, 32, 2 and 6 deaths respectively; and
alcohol was implicated in, or potentially contributed to, 165 deaths.

There are only slight differences from the corresponding numbers for 2008, which appear for the first time in this paper (the figures for 2008 that were published previously were on a different basis). Because of a change in the method used to collect information about the substances which were found in the body (see Section 2), "individual drugs" figures for 2008 and 2009 cannot be produced on the same basis as those for earlier years. However, an indication of longer-term trends can be obtained by comparing the annual averages for 2003-2007 and 1996-2000, which show:

marked increases in the numbers of deaths for which heroin and/or morphine, cocaine and alcohol were reported;
not much change in the numbers of deaths for which methadone, diazepam and ecstasy were reported; and
a marked fall in the number of deaths for which temazepam was reported.

Most drug-related deaths were of people who took more than one drug. There were relatively few deaths for which only one drug (and, perhaps, alcohol) was found present in the body, including 36 for which only heroin/morphine (and, perhaps, alcohol) was reported, and 10 for which only methadone (and, perhaps, alcohol) was mentioned. There were more deaths for which only one drug (and, perhaps, alcohol) was implicated in, or potentially contributed to, the cause (whether or not anything else was present), including 148 cases where that drug was heroin/morphine and 54 where it was methadone.

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