West Dunbartonshire campaigners: 'Time to tackle drugs head-on'

Nov 28 2008 by Marc McLean, Lennox Herald (main ed)

CAMPAIGNERS are once again calling for a radical rethink on tackling addiction – after a shock report showed West Dunbartonshire has the highest drug death rate in Britain.

They argue that a drug crisis centre and residential rehab is needed if the area’s severe addiction problems are to be properly addressed.

Death-related rates almost DOUBLED in West Dunbartonshire last year and figures for 2008 are also projected to be high.

Experts from The National Programme on Substance Abuse Deaths (np-SAD) recently produced a report on drug deaths after gathering information from 107 coroners and 115 jurisdictions in England and Wales, as well as from Northern Ireland, Channel Islands, Isle of Man, and the procurator fiscal for Dumbarton.

The report showed the area to have 20.56 deaths per 100,000 population, although West Dunbartonshire’s addiction services team insist the real figure for 2007 is 16.

Councillor Jim Bollan accused the council of having a “blinkered” approach to tackling drug addiction.

He added: “West Dunbartonshire Council has refused to even consider a residential drug rehab for local addicts. The council has also refused to consider a local crisis centre with medical back-up. The council refuses to promote or support local community or family-based approaches to drug misuse.

“I remain convinced some of the solutions to drug misuse will be found from within our own communities.

“If we are to stem the rise in these avoidable deaths then we need a radical fundamental rethink, with nothing ruled out, in how we shape and deliver drug addiction services locally.”

The report showed that the proportion of deaths involving heroin substitute methadone increased from 17 per cent to 20 per cent, with 295 cases recorded.

In Scotland, the cost of prescribing methadone last year was £25.7m.

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde alone accounted for 44 per cent of this figure with a bill of £11.6m.

Helen MacKenzie, of Dumbarton’s Families United drugs support group, said: “Methadone is only a means until addicts get their next fix. It doesn’t cure them, it never will.

“It keeps them addicted to what is also a class A drug.

“The answer to our drug problem, which is clearly even bigger than we thought, is total abstinence.

“There are no shortcuts, it’s got to be done through detox and residential rehabilitation.

She added: “We should also have a drug crisis centre in Dumbarton.”

MSP Jackson Carlaw, health spokesman for the Conservatives, spoke out last week after learning of Scotland’s costly methadone bill.

He said: “These figures demonstrate all too clearly the scale of the drugs crisis gripping Scotland. Conservatives have long argued that we have become over-dependent on methadone as a ‘treatment,’ which is precisely why we have worked so hard to create a new national drugs strategy based on recovery leading to abstinence.

“The attempts of the last decade to merely manage the problem have quite patently not worked. There is a clear political will to introduce a tough, zero-tolerance strategy to tackle drugs and drug dealers head-on.

“The SNP Government must not pass up this opportunity to change Scotland for the better. The time for action is now.”