Russia’s rise in drug overdose deaths is unlikely to end soon

Russia’s Federal Statistics Service showed that over 10,000 Russians died from drug use in 2021 – 37% more than in 2020 and twice as many as in 2019. Those numbers don’t include deaths recorded as ‘acute kidney failure’ which can be a sign of an overdose, or acute heart failure. And that’s before the invasion of Ukraine which has acted as a trigger for many.