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In Lisbon, Portugal yesterday, European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA) disclosed its European drug report revealing Estonia still sadly leading the way as «state where largest numbers of people die due to drug overdose».
Estonia – the leading drug death land
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The data dates back to 2013. Turns out, the year brought an average of 16 drug deaths per million inhabitants among Europeans aged 15–64 (not limited to EU, the analysis covered Norway and Turkey, while Greek data was missing – edit). Estonia is head and shoulders above the pack – with 127 deaths per million.
The 40 death threshold was cleared by seven nations, with Nordics topping the chart.
As assured Postimees by EMCDDA researcher Isabelle Giraudon, partly the topmost positions of Estonia and the Nordics may be explained by their diligence in looking into causes of deaths and faithfulness to forward the data.
«Meanwhile, the Estonian case is definitely also due to the use of fentanyl which is a very risky substance – it is very difficult to be dosed right and is related to a major share of overdoses,» observed Ms Giraudon, adding that lots of injectors in Estonia also have HIV.
Fentanyl aka «China White» begun its brutal slaughterer of Estonian addicts in 2012 when overdose deaths skyrocketed by 38 percent.
Medical version killing others
According to EMCDDA researcher Jane Mounteney, the fentanyl issue is not limited to Estonia as is currently the impression. In her scientific article this year, overdoses have recently killed people in nations like Germany, Finland and the UK.
Thus, Sweden showed 44 fentanyl deaths in 2013, and UK had 16 in 2012. Estonia, however, suffered nearly hundred such cases in 2013.
Fentanyl users tend to be added when for heroin is unavailable on European market for some reason. For instance, Slovakia featured a «heroin crisis» in 2009–2010 causing addicts to search for a replacement.
In other nations with high addict-death rates, the main culprit is overdoses of heroin.
«The peculiarity of Estonia is use of illegal fentanyl, while in Germany it was circulated as the medicine,» related Ms Mounteney, referring to the drug as used as pain killer by cancer patients (in sticker-patch form).
New worse stuff
«In Germany, for instance, doctors misused their power prescribing the medicine to people who needed it not. There have been cases of people purchasing medical fentanyl from cancer patients, and some have been searching for used patches scattered around medical institutions,» said Ms Mounteney.
EMCDDA notes that the Estonian situation has largely improved due to an antidote – naloxone – distributed to local addicts starting 2013. The substance brings an overdose victim back to life.
The previous report for 2012 said Estonia had 191 drug deaths per million inhabitants i.e. the naloxone plan has taken effect. Even so, this year’s report underlines that Estonian death rates are still eight times the European average.
Ms Giraudon noted that naloxone use is neither the only nor a quick fox for the problem. «What is needed is contacting the addicts and winning their trust, convincing them to attend treatment.»
EMCDDA says there is a new and worse drug circling the Baltics now called carfentanyl. Ms Mounteney said it spread in Latvia in 2012 and in Vilnius, Lithuania in 2013. Recently, fresh reports of its spread have come from Latvia.