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Drugs E-bulletin - November 2008

Welcome to the November 2008 edition of the e-bulletin for the Home Office drugs website.

This month's news includes:

• The 2009 FRANK Awards
• Opiate and crack cocaine statistics published
• Drug misuse declared: findings from the 2007/08 British Crime Survey
• Seizures of drugs in England and Wales, 2006/07

The 2009 FRANK Awards

Drugs organisations across the country are being encouraged to promote their projects and campaigns which have successfully raised awareness of drug issues and made an impact in their community, by nominating them for the FRANK award 2009.

The FRANK awards are designed to recognise and reward individuals or organisations who have used the FRANK campaign to deliver effective communications, campaigns or materials.

Nominations are now open for the following two categories:

• FRANK communications aimed at young people
• FRANK communications aimed at the wider community

Two awards will be given in each of the nine government regions in England and from these two overall category winners will then be selected. There is also a judges' award for the overall best use of FRANK.

For more information and to download a nomination form see the FRANK awards site.

Opiate and crack cocaine statistics published

National and regional estimates of the prevalence of opiate use and/or crack cocaine use in 2006/07 have been published in a new report.

The report summarises the results of the third and final phase of a three-year study to estimate the prevalence of problematic use of opiates and/or crack cocaine nationally (England only), regionally and locally.

Innovative methods have been used to estimate this hard-to-reach population. Overall, in 2006/07 there were an estimated 328,767 problem drug users in England. The figures show that the estimate for the total number of problem drug users has remained stable across the three phases of the study. Since the first stage there has been a significant reduction in the prevalence of drug injectors, which has fallen from 4.16 per thousand in 2004/05 to 3.47 per thousand in 2006/07.

Read the full report on opiate and crack cocaine statistics (new window).

Drug misuse declared: findings from the 2007/08 British Crime Survey

This report shows that drug use continues to fall in England and Wales, with overall drug use among adults and young people aged 16-24 now at the lowest level measured by the British Crime Survey (BCS).

The BCS provides estimates of the proportion of 16-59 year-olds who have used illicit drugs. There are three separate measures based on ever having used drugs, use in the last year and use in the last month.

According to the 2007/08 BCS:

• around one in three (35.8%) had ever used illicit drugs, one in ten had used in the last year (9.3%), and one in 20 in the last month (5.3%)
• Class A drug use was less common with 13.9% having used a Class A drug at least once in their lifetime, 3% had done so in the last year and 1.3% in the last month
• consistent with previous findings, cannabis is the type of drug most likely to be used; 7.4% used cannabis in the last year

The BCS has collected information on illicit drug use since 1996. Long term trends for those aged 16 to 59 show:

• use of any illicit drug in the last year has decreased from 11.1% in 1996 to 9.3% in 2007/08, due in part to successive declines in the use of cannabis
• last year, usage of Class A drugs among 16 to 59 year-olds has remained generally stable between 1996 and 2007/08
• there have been some decreases over the longer-term in the use of non-Class A drugs; between 1996 and 2007/08 last year use of cannabis, amphetamines, anabolic steroids and glues among 16 to 59 year-olds declined.

Comparing changes between 2006/07 and 2007/08:

• there was a decline in the level of any illicit drug use (from 10.0% to 9.3%) and any Class A drug use (from 3.4% to 3.0%) in the last year
• considering changes by type of drug showed decreases in last year usage of any cocaine, ecstasy, amphetamines, cannabis and glues

Read the full British Crime Survey report (new window).

Seizures of drugs in England and Wales, 2006/07

There were a record 186,028 drug seizures by police and HM Revenue and Customs in England and Wales in 2006/07 compared with 161,113 in 2005 - an increase of 15%.

Between 2004 and 2006/07, drug seizures have increased by 73%. This increase is largely accounted for by a rise in cannabis seizures, which is thought to be associated with the introduction of cannabis warnings from 1 April 2004.

There were increases in the number of seizures for all classes of drugs. In 2006/07, there were:

• 42,341 seizures of Class A drugs (up 10% since 2005)
• 8,796 seizures involving Class B drugs (up 15% since 2005)
• 140,377 seizures involving Class C drugs (up 20% since 2005)
• cocaine and heroin were the most commonly seized Class A drugs in 2006/07; there were 16,079 seizures of cocaine (up 35% since 2005) and 13,205 seizures of heroin (down one per cent since 2005)

Read the full report on seizures of drugs in England and Wales 2006/07 (new window).