Social costs from illicit drug use hit $1.3b

New research put the social costs of illicit drug use at $1.3 billion, Associate Health Minister Jim Anderton said today.

Mr Anderton chairs the ministerial committee on drug policy and tonight released figures from research on quantifying drug harm.

The research was carried out by Business and Economic Research Ltd and peer reviewed, including by Otago University public health expert Des O'Day.

The study had concluded "the harm from drugs consumed in 2006 is substantial and that illicit drug seizures may have prevented approximately another third again of harm".

Mr Anderton said the study had put the social costs of illicit drug use in 2006 at $1.31b – nearly 1 per cent of gross domestic product.

Illicit drug production cost the country $519 million, he said.

Related crime cost the country $414m.

Lost output due to illicit drug use was $106m.

Another $53m came from drug-attributable health care and road smashes.

"Over two fifths of social costs – 42 per cent or $551m – is caused by illicit stimulants. We know them as meth, or P," Mr Anderton said.

Over a third of the social costs of illicit drug use were caused by cannabis.

"That's $444m of social costs in 2006 from cannabis alone."

Mr Anderton said alcohol was by far and away the most destructive drug.

Alcohol was not part of the study he was releasing tonight. But according to the Ministry of Health, the social costs of alcohol misuse were between $1.5b and $2.4b a year.

But alcohol was not the most intrinsically harmful drug. It was the most harmful because it was the most widely used, he said.

More than 80 per cent of New Zealanders drank alcohol, while around 14 per cent used cannabis last year.

"On a proportionate basis, cannabis is the more harmful drug."

Mr Anderton said he was against making drugs more readily available.

The minister, who also voted against lowering the drinking age, said tonight that the number of car smashes and hospital admissions from 18 to 20-year-olds, and for those under 18, had gone up when the drinking age was lowered to 18 years.

He made the new research public at an Otago University Students' Association Forum on drug and alcohol harm.  

- NZPA