How drug, alcohol abuse is spiralling in Victoria after lockdowns

Victoria’s drug and alcohol treatment centres are overrun after the state’s lockdowns, while staff are urgently needed to avoid mounting tragedies.

Waiting lists for alcohol and drug treatment have blown out by 70 per cent since Victoria’s first Covid lockdowns eased as another 500 Victorians were lost to overdoses.

However, the state’s overrun drug and alcohol treatment centres say they have been stripped of $25m in funding and urgently need another 250 clinicians to avoid dozens more tragedies.

Their plea comes a day after the Herald Sun revealed the full extent of the state’s prescription drug crisis and the Victorian Coroner detailed another 500 deaths from overdoses in 2020-21.

The latest Coroner’s analysis reveals overdose deaths have slightly declined over the past three years, however three out of four involve pharmaceutical medications rather than illegal drugs.

Despite the tragedies, the Victorian Alcohol and Drug Association said $25m has been ripped from the sector in the past year — the equivalent of 100 full-time treatment workers.

With waiting lists at treatment centres increasing by 71.4 per cent — from 2385 in September 2020 to 4088 in December 2021 — VADA chief Sam Biondo said boosting services for vulnerable Victorians had to become an election priority.

The state’s overrun drug and alcohol treatment centres say they have been stripped of $25m in funding.

“Victoria’s alcohol and other drug (AOD) treatment system cannot meet community demand for treatment. Covid has only made this worse,” Mr Biondo said.

“The Victorian government funded an additional 100 full-time alcohol and other drug clinicians during the pandemic but this funding will cease later this year.

“This will make it incredibly difficult to meet soaring demand amid declining treatment capacity.”

As revealed by the Herald Sun on Tuesday, Victoria’s SafeScript real time prescription monitoring system detected the state’s doctors and pharmacists issuing 1.28 million potentially lethal prescriptions to people are risk of dependency or overdosing in the past two years.

In the Victorian Overdose Deaths 2012-2021 report released on Tuesday the state’s coroner revealed mandatory SafeScript system appeared to be reversing the prescription drug toll, with medication overdose deaths dropping to 376 in 2021 — down from 402 in 2020 and 427 in 2018.

Waiting lists for alcohol and drug treatment have blown out by 70 per cent since Victoria’s first Covid lockdowns eased. Picture: Jason Edwards

The decrease in prescription-related deaths followed an overall positive trend in overdoses, which cost 500 lives in 2021 — down from a record 543 in 2018.

But the Coroner’s Court found deaths involving methamphetamines have risen sharply from just 34 in 2012 to 137 last year.

Deaths from overdoses on new psychoactive substances — such as fake benzodiazepines being bought by those dependent on prescription sleeping and anti-anxiety pills — also rose to 35 in a trend the Victorian State Coroner judge John Cain described as “an emerging concern”.

The Coroner’s Court data also revealed:

• Pharmaceutical drugs contribute to 75 per cent of Victorian overdose deaths, with

benzodiazepines the most frequent contributor

• Almost three out of four overdose deaths involve multiple drugs

• Males are twice as likely as females to die from overdose, while those aged

between 35-54 are most at risk

• Morethan three-quarters of overdose deaths occur in metropolitan Melbourne

• Heroin-involved overdose deaths dropped from 212 in 2019 to 173 last year

“While it is encouraging to see overdose deaths decline, it remains concerning that 500 Victorian’s lost their lives last year,” Mr Cain said.

“These deaths are preventable and it is critical that we improve access to supports, treatment and education.

“Drug-related harms are always shifting, in response to changes in drug use, availability and

regulation. Through our data we can detect these shifts early and respond quickly, to save lives.”

Natalie’s spiral into addiction

When Natalie suffered anxiety and panic attacks her GP referred her to a psychiatrist who prescribed her a low dose of valium.

The dose was under 5mg, with a single pill to be taken once a day if needed. There was little or no talk of the complications the then 23-year-old may face by taking benzodiazepines, for which seven million prescriptions are written each year in Australia.

“The first time I took a benzo I didn’t feel drowsy at all. I felt fine. I felt great,” she said.

“I was just dealing with this anxiety for so long and I couldn’t believe how instantly better I was.

“The first couple of weeks to a month was great. I don’t know when it stopped having this kind of efficacy because my memory is foggy from this time ... ”

Somewhere between six and 12 months later the repeated scripts for low-dose valium were no longer able to suppress Natalie’s anxiety, despite the fact she’d begun carrying a bottle of pills with her everywhere in case she needed to discreetly rush into a bathroom to take a second or third.

After more panic attacks in 2014 a “cavalier” second psychiatrist decided Natalie needed a stronger benzo with a shorter half-life, so he wrote her a prescription for either Xanax and klonopin.

Eventually Natalie would be taking both of the high-strength benzodiazepines together, but such is the damage they caused she can no longer remember which was prescribed to her first.

“I was taking one of these each day and a stronger one for emergencies,” Natalie said.

“It is kind of ridiculous now looking back in hindsight, but this continued on for three or four years.

“While this was happening I was working, I was going back to university, so as far as I saw it I was functioning.”

When Natalie suffered anxiety and panic attacks her GP referred her to a psychiatrist who prescribed her a low dose of valium.

While studying and working as a freelance journalist, Natalie was also involved in a breakfast radio show until she was called to a meeting and let go over concerns she was becoming forgetful and absent-minded.

“I think that is what made it so dangerous — I didn’t have the foresight or the perspective to see how it (the medication) was impacting me because it allowed me to function so highly,” she said.

“They were definitely not working.

“Sometimes I felt like I needed to take a second or third one and I always had to have them with me.

“My mood was going down and I was getting really depressed.

“I would get extremely irritable with people. I developed a really short fuse — benzo rage is what they call that.”

By May 2017 Natalie’s depression had reached dangerous levels and she checked herself into hospital.

Doctors reviewing Natalie’s medications were stunned. Four years after seeking help for anxiety she was being routinely prescribed a cocktail of benzos including a mood stabiliser and a 90mg dose of an antidepressant — three times the standard dose.

Over the next fortnight psychiatrists cut Natalie’s benzo doses by 75 per cent in a process known as rapid tapering.

Plunged into crying spells and lashing out, Natalie then began suffering vertigo and had to wear earphones to drown out painful noises before leaving hospital in even worse shape than she went in.

By August 2017 Natalie had to use a cane to walk because her balance had deteriorated.

Brain scans cleared her of multiple sclerosis or early onset Parkinson’s disease, but it was only when a Google search uncovered the specialist Reconnexion benzodiazepine treatment service that Natalie’s doctor-induced dependency and withdrawal issues were finally addressed.

Starting on a 50mg dose of valium, Natalie had to slowly reduce her medication by .5mg and endure milder withdrawal symptoms every fortnight to a month to overcome her dependency safely.

“It took me three or four years to wean myself off the medication,” she said.

“At the same time I was trying to have some sort of normality, hold down a job and get on with my life.

“It’s taken me years to get my cognition and my memory going again and my brain is in a really good place now.

“I was extremely angry at my psychiatrist — extremely angry — particularly because it affected my mobility. I was very angry and I did feel very betrayed.

“But I’m in a much better headspace now and I’m glad that I can use my experience in a productive way.”