Children must be heard as Scotland's drug deaths continue to destroy families
The number of drug-related deaths will be announced this week, once again heralding one of the bleakest days in Scotland’s year.
Bleak because, once again, we are forced to confront the human cost of this crisis, in lost lives and bereaved families, and our enduring failure to ease the pain.
Bleak because this tragedy has become an annual opportunity for political point-scoring, for hand wringing and finger pointing, for turning a public health calamity coloured in shades of grey into binary black and white.
It has become a hollow, repetitive, black-edged day of claim and counter claim when too many of the voices that demand to be heard – including the voices of children - are lost in the stramash.
More than 600 children lost a parent in 2020 to drugs, according to analysis four years later, and there is nothing to suggest that level of loss, or its impact, has eased dramatically in the years since.
This time last year the National Records of Scotland revealed 1017 drug-related deaths in 2024, a year when 3167 children were placed on the child protection register. Almost 40 per cent of those registrations were linked to the substance use of parents.
Hundreds of children in Scotland lose parents to drugs every year. Thousands more grow up on the constant brink of crisis and the edges of care because of the impact of drug harm on their families. Their childhoods are turbulent, education sabotaged, talents untapped, and opportunities curtailed. It cannot go on. Our country cannot allow so many babies, children, and young people to be the invisible and forgotten victims of this crisis.
The number of lives lost to drugs last year will be revealed this month [WEDNESDAY 23 SEPTEMBER] when a single number will, inevitably, be framed as a simple measurement of our success, or otherwise, in tackling the worst drugs death rate in Europe.
It is, of course, more than a number. This is about life and death, grief, and loss, and our response demands more than over-hyped, quick win “solutions” or politically-motivated potshots. After the sound and fury, when the news cycle spins again, will we be any closer to tackling the symptoms of this crisis never mind the root causes? Well, we should be. We know what works and needs to be done. We have known for years.
Tomorrow? Next year? The decade after? That will demand practical policies, political will and far-sighted strategy to transform the lives and life chances of children living in our poorest postcodes. It demands long-promised support to end child poverty, close the attainment gap, create opportunities, jobs and apprenticeships, encourage hope, and rebuild thriving communities.
Today? We must do whatever we can, as much as we can, and certainly more than we are doing, to heal those lives damaged by substance use, shore up families, and support children to a better future. That means throwing a protective arm around them and their families. It means support that is expert, intensive, and encompassing and, most crucially, there when needed for as long as it is needed.
In his Programme for Government announced earlier this month, First Minister John Swinney promised to eradicate child poverty and treat drug use as a public health emergency, while vowing prevention and early help will be a seam running through our care, health and criminal justice services.
Look up prevention and early help in the dictionary and you might find a picture of our Mother and Child Recovery Houses. The Burrow in Falkirk and Discovery Grove in Dundee offer residential recovery spaces for pregnant and new mums with a history of substance issues, allowing them to recover while staying safely with their babies.
We wrap around both mother and child, supporting bonding, building their confidence as parents, and laying the foundations of a safe and secure childhood for their baby. Without our intensive support, many of those children would be placed in care. With it, three quarters of babies remain safely with their mothers when they leave. For all sorts of good reasons our two houses, backed by the Scottish Government and shaped by the experiences of the women living there, make sense.
Intensive perinatal support for pregnant and new mums and their babies transforms the lives of whole families. It is an investment which is already paying off in better lives, thriving families, stronger communities and (let’s not overlook this) significant money saved. An independent evaluation of our community-based intensive perinatal services in Falkirk estimated it saved £1million a year in avoided care placements for babies and other crisis interventions.
Money invested in drug and alcohol recovery and high quality, intensive support for mums and their children is best spent keeping families safely together, than managing their separation through a lifetime of crisis-led state intervention. This is true child protection. Wherever they live in Scotland, pregnant and new mums need a straightforward route to expert, effective and non-judgmental support, giving their children the best start.
This is not about new money but smarter spending, to ease the pressure on our partners in social work and health care in every region of Scotland. The big question is not whether our country can afford to roll out and scale up these services nationally, but whether we can afford not to?
One mum hailed the support she found in Discovery Grove after struggling to find the help she needed elsewhere:
It isn’t all cuddles and fluffy blankets, there is a lot of hard truths and hard work, but there is also kindness, patience, and respect. Until now, I had been crying out for help but felt like no one could hear.
It is time to start listening to Scotland’s mums and their children and now, today, is a good time to start.
Justina Murray
Aberlour CEO
This article was written for The Scotsman and published on 22nd September 2026.