Netherlands National Drug Monitor - Research and Documentation ...

the ICD-9 classification. Drug deaths are more easily recognisable in the ICD-10
classification than in the ICD-9 classification.
• Between 1996 and 2001 there was also a rise in the number of cases of “poisoning by
other or unspecified narcotics” and “poisoning by other or unspecified psychodysleptics”.
These cases often involve (combinations) of hard drugs, with or without other
substances, and sometimes also (combinations of) medicines and/or alcohol.
• From 2001 the death rate showed an unpredictable course. After declining in 2002,
it rose in 2004, then dropped in 2005, 2006 and 2007, only to rise again by 30%
in 2008.
• This number only relates to deaths among inhabitants who were officially registered
in the population register. In 2008, a further 21 cases were registered with Statistics
Netherlands (CBS) of drug deaths among people who were in the Netherlands at the
time of death, but were not registered in the population register as residents.
The number of registered deaths by opiate overdose is low in the Netherlands.
• Until 2001 this number fluctuated between 47 and 81 cases per annum. Between
2002 and 2008, deaths from opiate use fluctuated between 34 and 60 cases.
• As is the case with opiate users in general, overdose victims are also getting older,
and the percentage of younger opiate deaths is declining. From 1985 through 1989,
84% of fatal victims were younger than 35, compared to an average of 20% between
2005 and 2008 (Figure 4.7). In 2008 alone, the figure was 12%.
• Methadone was registered as a primary cause of death on only four occasions in 2007
and seven times in 2008. Generally, other substances are also involved.
100 Netherlands National Drug Monitor - NDM Annual Report 2009