Epidemiology of Inhalant Abuse - Archives - National Institute on ...

FIGURE 10. United Kingdom VSA-related deaths: Place where
substances abused.
occurred in circumstances where one might have expected some form <strong>of</strong>
supervision. Almost all were dead before arrival at the hospital.
PREVALENCE OF VSA IN THE UNITED KINGDOM
There is no systematic data collection mechanism in the United Kingdom
equivalent to the United States’ <strong>National</strong> Household Survey on Drug
<strong>Abuse</strong> or the Drug <strong>Abuse</strong> Warning Network. In 1993, the ISDD
published the third <strong>National</strong> Audit <strong>of</strong> Drug Misuse in Britain (<strong>Institute</strong> for
the Study <strong>of</strong> Drug Dependence 1993). To quote the introduction: “Strong
public and <strong>of</strong>ficial concern over the use <strong>of</strong> these substances (drugs <strong>of</strong>
abuse) is not matched by a system capable <strong>of</strong> effectively monitoring how
concerned we should be—how big the problem is. Instead, it is a case <strong>of</strong>
divining a pattern in mismatched bits <strong>of</strong> information from various and
disparate sources.” Although a General Household Survey is conducted
in the United Kingdom on a continuous basis, it asks only about tobacco
and alcohol use. The OPCS estimated that a sample <strong>of</strong> around 20,000
people aged 11 and over would be required to survey drug use nationally,
but this has not been attempted (Goddard 1987). Consequently, no
systematic longitudinal data are available but only a series <strong>of</strong> surveys,
mostly local and using nonstandardized methods.
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