Drink And Drug Problems Soar Amongst The Homeless
More than 21,000 homeless people have been admitted to hospital with problems relating to drink and drugs over the past three years.
A BBC investigation found the number of people of no fixed abode admitted for drug addiction increased by about a quarter between 2014 and 2016. The government said the issue was “complex” with “no single solution”.
To gauge the size of the problem, the BBC submitted Freedom of Information requests to 145 hospital trusts in Britain and Northern Ireland after it was revealed the number of homeless families in the UK had risen by more than 60 per cent since the beginning of the decade. The replies showed almost 11,000 people of no fixed abode were admitted to hospital suffering from alcohol-related issues since 2014, as well as more than 8,500 people with drug problems.
The total figure is likely to be higher as 20 trusts did not give figures if they had fewer than five cases in a year. The figures also reveal the number of people admitted to hospital with problems related to drugs has increased from about 2,500 in 2014 to more than 3,100 in 2016.
Caroline Bernard, the head of policy at Homeless Link, which acts on behalf of organisations working with homeless people in England, said there was a need for “clever solutions”. She added: “Cuts in funding for mainstream services mean people are ending up in A&E.”
Addiction therapist, Chip Somers, said the “hopelessness” of being on the streets was draining. “People come home stressed from work and drink half a bottle of wine, so imagine someone who has the stress of being homeless and helpless,” he said. He added the treatment of drug and alcohol addiction had fallen “through a hole” at a time when the use of ketamine or new psychoactive substances such as Spice had “gone through the roof”.
Mr Somers is calling for every community to have a fully staffed hostel service, with drug and alcohol workers and psychiatrists who could refer people to a rehab unit. “Rehab gets about 25% of people clean,” he said. “If you had 100 people go that is 25 of them out of the system. That requires a massive financial investment. I’m extremely pessimistic about the situation. I can see it reaching a crisis situation.”
However, a government spokeswoman said it had a “strong track record” on public health and prevention, with drug and alcohol abuse falling. She added that local authorities were set to receive £16bn over the current spending period to reduce health inequalities.
The government says it is committed to halving rough sleeping by 2020 and eliminating it by 2027. “We are investing £550m to 2020 to address the issue,” the spokeswoman added.
