LONDON, United Kingdom – December 2015. Public Health England released a report on adult substance misuse with 295,224 individuals having been in contact with drug and alcohol services between April 2014 to March 2015. In addition to alcohol and drug treatment presentations, the number of individuals aged 18 or over using a new psychoactive substance (NPS) or one or more club drug(s) is reported. ‘Club drugs and NPS’ refers to a number of different substances typically used by people in bars and nightclubs, at concerts and parties, before and after a night out.

The number of individuals presenting to treatment for a club drug or NPS more than doubled from 2,727 (2009-10) to 5,532 (2014-15). The largest increases were recorded for mephedrone, rising from 953 in 2010-11 to 2,024 in 2014-15. Conversely, the number of individuals citing ‘ecstasy’ has fallen from 1,756 in 2009-10 to 1,284 in 2014-15, a decrease of 27%. The authors acknowledge that in part, the trend is likely to reflect increased availability and the time it takes recording practice changes to embed in. For example, NPS as a reporting category was only introduced into National Drug Treatment Monitoring System (NDTMS) in 2013-14 without having been fully implemented by all treatment providers at the beginning of that year. Therefore the strong increase between 2013-14 and 2014-15 might be due to better recording of NPS presentations.

The data was collected through the NDTMS and is used by national and local government to monitor the availability and effectiveness of alcohol and drug treatment in England.

Trends in number of new presentations to treatment citing club drug use

Source: Public Health England, Adult substance misuse statistics from the National Drug Treatment Monitoring System (NDTMS).

For further information please see:
http://www.nta.nhs.uk/uploads/adult-statistics-from-the-national-drug-treatment-monitoring-system-2014-2015.pdf