Scotland claims fewer drug deaths – but contaminated drug deaths were omitted

There are claims of fewer drug deaths in Scotland, albeit it still 2.7 times the UK drug-death average – but definitions in AnnexA p4 of Drug-related deaths in Scotland in 2022 specify that, where drugs were contaminated with another toxin and/or led to infections, they were removed from the drug death count – ie, the more contaminated the drug, the less likely it features in statistics.