Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment he has made of the effect of the abstinence based approach for the treatment of drug addiction on levels of deaths from drug misuse.

The provision of both harm reduction and abstinence based interventions is essential to any drug treatment system. Each local authority is responsible for ensuring there is a full range of drug treatment services available in their area to meet the needs of their local population.

During the recent Public Health England led inquiry into the rise in drug-related deaths, analysis of the treatment population did not establish a direct relationship between a policy focus on abstinence and drug-related deaths.