Drug addiction management costs UK £3.6bn a year: Report

By Dr. Ananya Mandal, MDJun 19 2011

According to a latest report from the think tank the Centre for Policy Studies (CPS), drug addiction costs £3.6bn a year for both treating problem drug users and keeping them on benefits. The study by has criticised government plans to change the way authorities tackle drug addiction. It claims the plans for payment-by-results schemes are “doomed to failure, not least because they are being run by the very organizations responsible for the current failure of policy”.

Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke said he wants to divert people with drug problems away from prison and into treatment as part of a “rehabilitation revolution”. CPS argues plans to reward addicts who have improved their employment prospects but who are not being treated for drug addiction are “seriously misguided”.

Its report says measures like prescribing methadone to drug addicts delays their recovery. It adds, “There is one simple measure of success: that of six months' abstinence from drugs.” The report calls for a “transfer of power” to smaller rehabilitation units to help addicts change their behaviour. “Solving the drug problem means recognising the problem for what it is: one of addiction,” it says. Kathy Gyngell, chairwoman of the prisons and addictions policy forum at the CPS and the report's author, said prescribing methadone to drug addicts delays their recovery from addiction and has been “extremely expensive”.

The CPS estimates the annual cost of maintaining treatment and paying benefits to the 320,000 problem drug users was £3.6bn. This breaks down as £1.7bn in benefits, £1.2bn looking after the children of drug addicts and £730m in methadone prescriptions. The CPS says there are as many addicts now as in 2004/2005 and that fewer than 4% leave treatment free of dependency. “The social and moral costs are far greater still,” the report said.

A spokesman for the Department of Health added, “The 2010 Drug Strategy is fundamentally different from those that have gone before. Instead of focusing primarily on reducing the harms caused by drug misuse, our approach will be to go much further and offer every support for people to choose recovery as an achievable way out of dependence.” He went on, “Following a public consultation, Building Recovery in Communities, work is under way to support local recovery systems tailored to the needs of communities, many of which are already showing positive results. The creation of Public Health England at a national level, to support and oversee local commissioning arrangements for drugs and alcohol services, is the best vehicle for taking forward the Government's ambition of recovery for people dependent on alcohol or drugs.”