Cocaine and heroin supplies hit record highs worldwide

Coast Guard personnel aboard the USS Boutwell while officials unload cocaine bullets captured at sea during a deployment on April 16, 2015 at the San Diego Naval Base in San Diego , in California.

According to a new report, cocaine supplies and heroin seizures have reached record levels.

Supplies of cocaine in 2016 and opium from 2016 to 2017 have reached their highest level ever recorded, according to the 2018 World Drug Report released by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) on Tuesday.

Non-medical use of prescription drugs, like fentanyl, also become a major threat to public health, contributing increasingly to overdose deaths, particularly in the United States.

Globally, drug-related deaths reached approximately 450,000 in 2015. Nearly 40% of these deaths are a direct result of drug use – primarily opioid overdoses. The remaining 60% of these deaths were attributable to the indirect use of drugs, such as HIV and hepatitis C obtained as a result of at-risk injections.

The report also found that fentanyl and its analogues remain particularly problematic in the United States. and Canada, while the use of non-medical tramadol – another type of opioid analgesic – is increasing in Asia and "skyrocketing in parts of Africa," notes the report.

"The drug markets are growing, with cocaine and opium production reaching record highs, with multiple challenges on many fronts," UNODC Executive Director Yury Fedotov said in a statement. communicated.

"The real problems for us have been the increase in opium production in Afghanistan and the massive increase in cocaine production, especially because of Colombia," added Thomas Pietschmann, expert in drug research at UNODC and one of the leading authors. report.

Drug use increases among baby boomers

About 275 million people in the world aged 15 to 64 have used drugs at least once in 2016, the latest year for which data are available.

Cannabis was the most widely used drug, with 192 million users, followed by opioids and amphetamines with 32 million users each, according to the report.

Surprisingly, drug use among older generations – those aged 40 and over – is growing faster than younger demographics. In the United States, drug use among those aged 50 and over increased sevenfold between 1996 and 2016, Pietschmann said.

"Boomers are getting older and still taking drugs – we are seeing this in Europe, the United States, South America and Australia," said Pietschmann, adding that they are not on the radar most authorities in the world looking at the use of drugs.

The report also found that women – who account for 33% of drug users – consume significantly less than men. However, once women begin to consume, they are much more likely to become addicted to drugs than men, the report says.

Help suppliers

Tramadol has been linked to various terrorist networks in the Middle East and has been a cause of both growing dependency and instability in Africa, the report says.

India has been a major supplier of tramadol, and recent control measures in the country are expected to reduce overall total supply, according to Pietschmann.

"I hope it will become much less widespread than in the past.There is temporary hope when it comes to tramadol," Pietschmann said.

However, reducing the supply of cocaine and heroin is much more complicated. In 2016, about 1,410 tons of cocaine were produced worldwide, the highest level ever recorded. And between 2016 and 2017, globopium production jumped to 10,500 tonnes, the largest amount ever recorded by UNODC.

Insecurity in Colombia and Afghanistan has, in large part, fueled the record cocaine and heroin supply, as deteriorating economic conditions have encouraged the cost-effective substitution of coca and poppy crops for cocaine and heroin. traditional and less profitable cultures, according to Alexander Soderholm. Coordinator at the London School of Economics International Drug Policy Unit. He was not involved in the report.

"The drug markets are the only alternatives for farmers in environments where there are few viable alternatives," Soderholm said.

Addressing large increases in drug supply requires large-scale alternative development policies. For example, governments can provide farmers with profitable livelihoods outside the illicit drug culture, Pietschmann said.

But Soderholm fears that the outbreak of cocaine and heroin supply serve as a justification to governments for let's go back to the traditional, heavy military-military interventions that we know they just do not work. "

Epidemic in the United States

The current opioid crisis in the United States also remains a central problem. According to Pietschmann, this has contributed to an increase in the number of drug-related deaths since 2000. "We are talking about 64,000 people who are dying in 2016 from drugs," he said.

The opioid epidemic in the United States caused widespread overdose deaths and contributed to the decline in the average age of Americans in 2015 and in 2016.

Most overdose deaths result from the consumption of fentanyl, a synthetic opioid that will likely become more invasive worldwide, Soderholm said.

Bad solutions

Health services and addiction treatment are still far below what is needed, as only one in six people with medical disorders receive treatment, according to the report.

"We need continuous improvement in prevention and treatment – it's there, but only a small proportion of people who need treatment get treatment. permanent and he is still there, "said Pietschmann.

Only 79 countries have a needle and syringe exchange program as well as an opioid substitution treatment – such as the use of methadone to treat opioid addiction – and only four of these countries have high coverage for both types of intervention.

The report calls for not only more treatment, but also treatment tailored to the special needs of older users as well as women – whose drug use differs from that of men. Women are much more likely to increase the rate of drug use much faster than men, according to the report.

Additional follow-up and treatment research is also needed to better understand which programs work best.

But we are in an era where anyone with reasonable skills in chemistry – or someone enterprising enough – can produce drugs in his basement or his kitchen, and new unlisted fentanyl analogues. can be made almost instantly. "What we need are more radical solutions," he said.

Soderholm believes that the decriminalization of possession and personal use of drugs, which would reduce the social and economic costs of massive incarceration and free more resources to invest in treatment and prevention, are a few steps away. in the right direction.