With drug deaths in Scotland rising by 11 per cent in 2025, we continue to have the highest rate of fatalities in Europe. It’s clear that Scotland has a drug death crisis, but perhaps we also have a crisis in the way that we understand addiction.
For too long, drug-related deaths and drug abuse in Scotland were viewed primarily as a personal failing, and dealt with almost exclusively through a criminal justice lens. Before the turn of the millennium, addiction was met with harsh law enforcement as though addiction could be beaten out of a person with a harsher sentence or heavier hand. Unsurprisingly, this backfired catastrophically.
A key part of Scotland’s war on drugs was a restraint on needles used to inject drugs such as heroin, but this ultimately forced addicts to share needles. This resulted in many addicts contracting HIV: a 1986 study showed that 51 per cent of 164 heroin users tested positive with the same virus that caused AIDS.
Additionally, prison sentences for drug use were not uncommon, with the average prison sentence for general drug offences in Scotland being approximately 590 days in the late 1980s and early 1990s. This sent out a clear message: addiction was something to be punished for, not something to treat. Yet again this was a momentous catastrophe, resulting in immense overcrowding in Scottish prisons and a ludicrous amount of people leaving prison with a continued drug addiction, and many even developing one whilst in the prison system.
Over time, it became clear that this strategy of punishment without addressing the problem was a moot point. The solution? The 2008 ‘Road to Recovery’ strategy. This was a drugs strategy focusing on recovery, prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation, as opposed to the cut-throat and futile approach previously in place.
The ‘Road to Recovery’ illustrated the shift from addiction being viewed as a personal failure to it being seen as much more of a societal issue. It involved the implementation of prevention policies, such as establishing early-years and youth frameworks to tackle the poverty and health inequalities that act as a driver for substance misuse, and pushing public campaigns, specifically education campaigns. These methods, in combination with the expansion of drug treatment and testing orders for lower-tariff offenders, may seem like a surefire way to improve drug addiction. But the statistics say otherwise, showing that 2020 was the peak of recorded drug-related deaths in Scotland with 1339 drug-related deaths.
However, during this window there was a further shift in attitudes and in policy. From 2016, the Scottish government began treating addiction as a public health concern, most notably moving the responsibility for drugs and alcohol policy to the health department. This key change evolved over years, eventually laying the groundwork for several other approaches; most notably, the UK’s first safe consumption room, which opened in Glasgow in 2025. The aim was to create an environment where addicts can take drugs safely, preventing overdoses, disease transmission, and decreasing public drug use. Whilst being the centre of much controversy, the scheme is undoubtedly a success, with staff and experts alike praising it. First Minister John Swinney said that Scotland’s drug death figures “would have been worse” without the facility.
When comparing Scotland with the rest of the world, it is clear that the move towards addiction being treated as a public health concern is the best way forward . With Portugal having some of the lowest overdose rates in Western Europe after decriminalising all personal drug use, and Norway ranking highest on the drug policy index whilst emphasising a health-centred approach boasting treatment availability and a focus on reducing the stigma of substance use, it’s hard to understand why we ever thought a justice heavy approach was the most effective.
Photo by Juli Vo on Unsplash.
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We can’t continue to punish addiction away
With drug deaths in Scotland rising by 11 per cent in 2025, we continue to have the highest rate of fatalities in Europe. It’s clear that Scotland has a drug death crisis, but perhaps we also have a crisis in the way that we understand addiction.
For too long, drug-related deaths and drug abuse in Scotland were viewed primarily as a personal failing, and dealt with almost exclusively through a criminal justice lens. Before the turn of the millennium, addiction was met with harsh law enforcement as though addiction could be beaten out of a person with a harsher sentence or heavier hand. Unsurprisingly, this backfired catastrophically.
A key part of Scotland’s war on drugs was a restraint on needles used to inject drugs such as heroin, but this ultimately forced addicts to share needles. This resulted in many addicts contracting HIV: a 1986 study showed that 51 per cent of 164 heroin users tested positive with the same virus that caused AIDS.
Additionally, prison sentences for drug use were not uncommon, with the average prison sentence for general drug offences in Scotland being approximately 590 days in the late 1980s and early 1990s. This sent out a clear message: addiction was something to be punished for, not something to treat. Yet again this was a momentous catastrophe, resulting in immense overcrowding in Scottish prisons and a ludicrous amount of people leaving prison with a continued drug addiction, and many even developing one whilst in the prison system.
Over time, it became clear that this strategy of punishment without addressing the problem was a moot point. The solution? The 2008 ‘Road to Recovery’ strategy. This was a drugs strategy focusing on recovery, prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation, as opposed to the cut-throat and futile approach previously in place.
The ‘Road to Recovery’ illustrated the shift from addiction being viewed as a personal failure to it being seen as much more of a societal issue. It involved the implementation of prevention policies, such as establishing early-years and youth frameworks to tackle the poverty and health inequalities that act as a driver for substance misuse, and pushing public campaigns, specifically education campaigns. These methods, in combination with the expansion of drug treatment and testing orders for lower-tariff offenders, may seem like a surefire way to improve drug addiction. But the statistics say otherwise, showing that 2020 was the peak of recorded drug-related deaths in Scotland with 1339 drug-related deaths.
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However, during this window there was a further shift in attitudes and in policy. From 2016, the Scottish government began treating addiction as a public health concern, most notably moving the responsibility for drugs and alcohol policy to the health department. This key change evolved over years, eventually laying the groundwork for several other approaches; most notably, the UK’s first safe consumption room, which opened in Glasgow in 2025. The aim was to create an environment where addicts can take drugs safely, preventing overdoses, disease transmission, and decreasing public drug use. Whilst being the centre of much controversy, the scheme is undoubtedly a success, with staff and experts alike praising it. First Minister John Swinney said that Scotland’s drug death figures “would have been worse” without the facility.
When comparing Scotland with the rest of the world, it is clear that the move towards addiction being treated as a public health concern is the best way forward . With Portugal having some of the lowest overdose rates in Western Europe after decriminalising all personal drug use, and Norway ranking highest on the drug policy index whilst emphasising a health-centred approach boasting treatment availability and a focus on reducing the stigma of substance use, it’s hard to understand why we ever thought a justice heavy approach was the most effective.
Photo by Juli Vo on Unsplash.
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