Council chiefs have called for greater regulation and surveillance of the use of illegal drugs in response to what they have called ‘worrying new trends’.
Data from the Office for National Statistics shows that for most individual drug types, there was no significant change in use in 2023 compared to in 2020, except changes in the use of hallucinogens, ecstasy and nitrous oxide.
Reported hallucinogen use increased from 0.7% to 1% of people aged 16-59 from 2020-23, while reported use of ecstasy and nitrous oxide fell.
The chair of the Local Government Association’s community wellbeing board, David Fothergill, said: ‘Although it is encouraging that rates of drug misuse have remained stable, this is masking worrying new trends in drug use.
‘We are particularly concerned to see a rise in the use of new synthetic opioids and benzodiazepines which substantially raise the risk of incredibly serious harm to the user and are believed to be linked to a number of drug related deaths.
‘Councils want to see greater regulation of the sale of substances online that often enter the UK in the post and increased surveillance to alert authorities to the types of drugs people are taking.’
