Germany has become the country with the most deaths related to drug use within the European Union, registering 1,826 deaths in 2021, according to the ‘European Drug Report 2023: Trends and news’, published last Friday.
These are 245 more deaths than in 2020. Behind Germany is Spain, with 774 deaths related to the use of narcotic drugs in 2020, and Sweden, with 450 deaths, according to data from 2021.
The upward trend is reflected throughout the territory of the community bloc, where overdoses claimed the lives of 6,166 people in 2021 —with an estimated mortality rate of 18.3 deaths per million people between 15 and 64 years old—, in comparison with 5,796 deaths registered in 2020.
Despite the limitations of the data from the European drug agency, based in Lisbon, for certain countries it is estimated that in 74% of the reported cases of lethal overdose the substances consumed were opioids, including heroin and its metabolites, often in combination with other substances.
Many deaths were also caused by drugs such as amphetamine and methamphetamine. Of the 21 countries with available post-mortem data for 2021, 19 reported non-cocaine drug use deaths, with the highest number reported in Germany (348 cases), Turkey (184), Finland (49), Norway (47), Austria (41), Sweden (36) and Denmark (35).
In addition, a drastic increase in overdose deaths among people aged 50 to 64 years was observed in the last decade: deaths grew by 69% between 2012 and 2021, 31% among women and 86% among men . with RT