UK had highest number of young cocaine users in Europe, shows report
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Version 0 of 1. EU drugs agency says availability of cocaine in Europe is at its highest More young adults in Britain than anywhere else in Europe took cocaine in 2018, as availability hits unprecedented levels across the continent, according to the EU drugs agency. A report on the latest trends in illicit drug use suggests that 5.3% of people aged between 15 and 34 in the UK took cocaine in 2018, the most recent year for which records are available. About half of Europe’s 15,000 crack-related treatment demands have been reported by the UK authorities. The second highest proportion of cocaine users in 2018 was recorded by Denmark and the Netherlands, where 3.9% of young adults had taken the drug in the 12 months previous to being asked about their habits. Alexis Goosdeel, the director of the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction, said cocaine’s role in Europe’s drug problem was increasing just as Europe was heading into an economic recession. The purity of cocaine sold on the streets is higher than ever. The number of seizures in the EU reached the highest levels ever recorded, with more than 110,000 reported in 2018, amounting to 181 tonnes, suggesting an “unprecedented level” of availability. “It is a perfect storm we want to avoid,” Goosdeel said. The additional concern in the UK will be that a significant proportion of the shipments entering Spain, Belgium or the Netherlands have subsequently ended up in the British market. Last year, a Home Office drug review led by Prof Carol Black found that middle-class drug takers were driving a rise in heavy cocaine use. Goosdeel said organised crime had also proven to be “extremely resilient” during the coronavirus pandemic, fuelling a digital transformation of the illicit trade in consumer countries. With street dealing affected by restrictions on movement, consumers and dealers turned to the use of online “dark net” markets, social media platforms and parcel and home delivery services. He added that during the pandemic there has been an increase in the “cashless” purchase of drugs. Goosdeel said: “What we also observe that during the period of the pandemic, certainly in the first phase of the lockdown for obvious reasons … there has been different ways to still purchase drugs they used the web, Facebook or other social media or are using messaging systems that are encrypted and in some cases using the dark net.” Monitoring of the illegal drugs market suggests that, at wholesale level, smuggling by air passenger transport declined during the pandemic but that trafficking by maritime shipping continued at pre-pandemic levels. Synthetic drug production and cannabis cultivation in Europe also did not appear to be seriously affected. Goosdeel said there was widespread infiltration of the legitimate supply chains by the drug gangs. “Large shipments are becoming the main way of conveying these drugs through the European territory,” he said. The agency found that across Europe, overdoses in the 50-plus age group were a concern, with a 75% increase between 2012 and 2018. There were an estimated 8,300 overdose deaths in 2018. |