Human Costs Related to Drug Use - Eurad

This paper by the drugs and alcohol monitoring units in the Nordic countries explores different approaches to quantify the human costs related to drug use. The data come from a representative survey of 3092 respondents above the age of 18 in four Nordic capitals: Copenhagen, Helsinki, Oslo and Stockholm.

The results show that in most Nordic capitals more than half of the respondents at some time have known and worried about the drug use of somebody they know personally. Moreover, while the average reported harm was about 2 on a scale from 0 to 10, a significant minority (10%) of those knowing drug users indicated that the harm was above 5.

Under-prioritization of drug-related problems

It is well known that many persons have at some time personally known somebody who uses drugs. The study shows that this causes significant human harm and should be included in the estimate of the social cost of illegal drugs. These results are relevant in the debate on the size of the drug problem as well as for targeting groups that experience the highest costs.

The results show that it is important to include human harm to get a more accurate picture of the overall cost of drugs in society.

Even very conservatively measured, the cost of human harm among relatives outweighs other large costs that are often included when estimating the cost of drug use, such as the prison cost for drug offences.

Ignoring human harm could lead to underestimation of the total costs, which in turn could result in under-prioritization of drug-related problems.
For example, the results of the study suggest that there may not be enough support services for families and friends of drug users in the Nordic societies.

The survey also indicates that it may be more stable and useful not to measure harm in monetary terms since respondents often have difficulties answering these questions.

Instead, simple questions about knowledge and harm on a 0–10 scale seemed to give more meaningful answers. These results show that every year about 25% of the population of the capital cities know and worry about drug users and that about 10% of those knowing drug users report a harm of more than 5.

Women suffer most

Finally, the results highlight the unequal distribution of the costs. The main costs were not born by the state or society at large, but by the women who were close to the drug user.

Although the direction of this effect is not surprising, the results still document the surprisingly large difference between harm reported by males and friends on the one hand, and harm reported by women and relatives on the other.

Read the paper exploring different approaches to quantify the human costs related to drug use here:

 

Harm to others by drugs(8 6 5kb)