A new report has revealed Australia continues to record hundreds of unintentional deaths every year caused by pharmaceutical opioids.
The Pennington Institute's annual overdose report, which was released on International Overdose Awareness Day, has revealed Australia recorded 882 unintentional deaths involving opioids in 2019. This equated to 53.6 per cent of all unintentional drug-induced deaths.
"As a group, pharmaceutical opioids accounted for 48.6% of unintentional drug-induced deaths involving opioids in 2019, with 429 deaths," says the report.
The number of unintentional drug-induced deaths involving opioids has nearly trebled in the last 14 years, increasing from 338 in 2006 to 882 in 2019.
According to Pennington Institute CEO John Ryan, "Although you’d be forgiven for thinking that illicit drugs are the main substances implicated in overdose, pharmaceutical drugs – opioids, benzodiazepines (sedative drugs), anti-depressants and anti-convulsants – are detected in most overdose deaths."
Mr Ryan said the burden of overdose deaths is not evenly shared.
"Aboriginal Australians are almost four times as likely to die of an overdose as non-Aboriginal Australians. Overdose deaths are more common in rural and regional areas, Australians in middle age and men," he said.
"Combining the Commonwealth’s own estimate of the value of a year of life lost with the average of 33 years of life lost for each overdose death means that overdose deaths alone cost our economy more than $15.5 billion every year. The cost to the families who lose a loved one is impossible to calculate."
Mr Ryan called for the development of a National Overdose Prevention Strategy with a focus on the drivers of drug use, the diversity of drugs that are causing overdose and how overdose risks are evolving.
"This strategy must be developed carefully but - crucially - it must also be developed urgently," he said.
One of the issues already identified by decision-makers, including the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee, is cost as a barrier to treatment for opiate dependence due to "prohibitive private fees".
The committee recently launched a post-market review of medicines reimbursed through the Opiate Dependence Treatment Program (ODTP).
The ODTP pays the makers of medicines for opiate dependence but patients are denied the protection of PBS co-payments and the safety net. They are forced to pay private dispensing fees, which can exceed $200 per month, with around 75 per cent of patients accessing their ODTP medicine through community pharmacies.
The Pharmaceutical Society of Australia (PSA) marked International Overdose Awareness Day and called for naloxone to be PBS-subsidised without a prescription.
“Naloxone is a life-saving medicine that can temporarily reverse opioid overdose, allowing enough time for an ambulance to arrive," said national president Associate Professor Chris Freeman.
“Whilst it is now available over the counter across the country, the price of this medicine puts it out of reach for many, and a prescription is required in order to receive the PBS subsidy. The current process is simply not working in the best interests of those who need it most.
“Whilst we welcome short term trials to improve access in New South Wales, Western Australia, and South Australia, this does not go far enough.“We need to improve access to this life-saving medicine through all pharmacies across all jurisdictions, by making it the first pharmacist-initiated and supplied PBS item - in doing so, we can decrease the amount of deaths from overdose."
