The Times: Poverty

Drugs costing Scottish society £3.5bn a year
Scotland’s drug addicts spend almost £1.4bn a year feeding their habit while NHS spends almost £2bn a year treating them

Sha Marai is pointing out the important issue in her article about the drug problem in Scotland. Scotland is the drug addiction capital of Europe with addicts collectively spending around 1.4 billion pound in a year feeding their habit. The society of Scotland is spending 3.5 billion pound per year for treatment and among others tackling the nation's drug problem. Not only the amount of money needed for treatment of this problem has increased, also the number of addicts has made an enormous rise. Additionally the government has to handle the consequences of this problem, such as criminal justice costs for instance. This issue shows the scale of the problem both in human terms and in financial terms. Finally I may quote the statement of David Liddell, the director of Scottish Drugs Forum: “These figures underline all too clearly why we must continue to invest in treatment, focus that investment on the most effective range of treatment, care and rehabilitation services — including in areas like housing, family support and employability, and continue to address the underlying issues of poverty, deprivation and other social and health inequalities.” If there will be no immediate intervention of the government and no right treatment, then Scotland's problems will soon dominate its daily life.