Cannabis most widely used drug, 2 new drugs detected per week in Europe: EU

Cannabis remains the most widely consumed drug in Europe, but new drugs were detected at the rate of around two per week in the European Union (EU) last year, said a new report released by the EU's drugs agency on Thursday.

The European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA) said in its annual review that an estimated 19.3 million adults were reported to have used cannabis last year, of these 14.6 million being young adults from 15 to 34 years old. It also estimated that around 1.0 percent of all adults in the EU are daily or almost daily users.

Population surveys of Germany, Spain and Britain reported decreasing or stable cannabis prevalence over the past decade. In contrast, rising use was observed in Bulgaria, France and four Nordic countries including Denmark, Finland, Sweden and Norway.

A total of 101 new drugs were reported in 2014, up from 81 substances in 2013, continuing an upward trend in substances notified in a single year. This brought the total number of substances being monitored by the agency to over 450, with more than half identified in the last three years alone, said the EMCDDA.

Although problems relating to heroin use still accounted for a large share of the drug-related health and social costs in Europe, recent trends in this area have been "relatively positive," said the EMCDDA, noting an "overall stagnation in demand for this drug."

Besides, opioid dependence was often a chronic condition, and providing appropriate treatment and care to long-term opioid users was a growing challenge for drug treatment and social services, said the EMCDDA.

The Internet plays a growing role in supplying and marketing drugs to Europeans, with new drugs and established drugs both offered for sale online, a source of increased concern for the EMCDDA.

"The growth of online and virtual drug markets pose major challenges to law enforcement and drug control policies," noted the report, "existing regulatory models will need to be adapted to perform in a global and virtual context."

"The report shows that we are confronted with a rapidly changing, globalised drug market and, therefore, we need to be united, swift, and determined in our response to the drugs threat," said Dimitris Avramopoulos, European Commissioner for Migration, Home Affairs and Citizenship.

"I am particularly concerned that the Internet is increasingly becoming a new source of supply, for both controlled and uncontrolled psychoactive substances," added Avramopoulos. Endit