Executive Director of NZ Drug Foundation Sarah Helm. Photo: Supplied
The NZ Drug Foundation is concerned that an increased number of deaths and hospitalisations from stimulant drugs like methamphetamine and cocaine may continue to rise.
The foundation has released a new report Drug overdoses in Aotearoa 2025 which tracked overdose deaths between 2016-2024 using coronial data.
Drug Foundation executive director Sarah Helm said that while the increase in stimulant harm was expected given a sharp uptick in cocaine and methamphetamine use, it was a worrying trend nonetheless.
"Given what we know about the sustained higher levels of methamphetamine consumption, we fear that this may only be the beginning of a serious spike in hospitalisations and deaths from stimulants."
She was also concerned that many people were unfamiliar with what a stimulant overdose looked like and encouraged people to familiarise themselves with the signs.
Common symptoms include a high temperature, difficultly breathing, extreme agitation or paranoia, chest pains, seizures and loss of consciousness.
The report also showed an increase in deaths from novel substances, with nitazenes (a family of potent synthetic opioids) and bromazolam (a novel black-market benzodiazepine) appearing in official drug death data for the first time.
"We're worried about the increasing volatility of our local drug market and the number of novel substances that are now in the mix, especially with increasing use of online drug markets," Helm said.
Helm said that mixing drugs continued to be the biggest driver of fatal overdoses.
"One of the clearest messages in this report is that mixing drugs, including medicines or alcohol, increases the risk of serious harm.
"More than half of all deaths in closed coronial cases involved four or more different drugs. Mixing drugs - especially two or more depressants - significantly increases the risk," she said.
Overall, fatal overdoses decreased slightly in 2024 based on provisional data, with 148 deaths in contrast to 177 in 2023.
But Helm said that the number of deaths was still unacceptably high and not enough was being done to bring it down.
"We are losing almost three New Zealanders every week to preventable overdose - twice the number of people we lose to drowning. That's hundreds of families and loved ones suffering unimaginable grief."
Helm said the current system was woefully ill-equipped and underfunded to both prevent and respond to harm and a comprehensive overdose prevention plan for New Zealand was needed.
The report also called for a 'Good Samaritan' law that would remove criminal penalties for people calling for help in the event of an overdose, improved access to the opioid overdose reversal medication naloxone, overdose prevention and response services, and a national overdose surveillance system to enable better real-time monitoring.
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