The number of intentional overdoses treated at the State hospital increased by more than a third in 2016 as experts faced “one of the heaviest years ever”, the Times of Malta has learnt.
Health sources told this newspaper that around 340 patients had been treated after deliberately overdosing last year, around 120 more than in 2015.
The Times of Malta had asked the Health Ministry for a breakdown of all the overdoses treated, however, it did not reply to various questions sent, providing only a list of the substances used in the overdoses. These included a number of different prescription medications, illicit narcotics and even household items such as bleach.
Meanwhile, sources at the hospital said more than half of them were antidepressants and anxiety medication – which ties in with figures showing that mental health was the leading cause of intentional overdoses.
In fact, Mater Dei Hospital documents seen by this newspaper, showed that some 56 per cent of premeditated overdoses used these types of medications.
Sources said that benzodia-zepine, more commonly known by its brand name Valium, was the most commonly used: one in three of the planned overdoses were of this substance. A psychoactive medication, it is commonly prescribed in cases of severe anxiety. Often referred to as a ‘silencer’, the substance inhibits brain activity by blocking neurons, which users often call ‘quietening’.
Access to the drug is highly controlled by the government’s dangerous drugs schedule which obliges patients to present monthly prescriptions and a special permit issued by the Health Department on the recommendation of a psychiatrist.
Nearly the same amount of people who planned to “self-poison” resorted to antidepressants, while some 10 per cent of the overdoses were caused by cocktails of the two drugs mixed together.
Back in 2015 Mental Health Services chairman Anton Grech had alluded to this, saying: “The medication being abused, such as benzodiazepine, is a clear indication that the victim or a relative is undergoing psychiatric treatment and has easy access to the drug, whose prescription is very controlled.”
Meanwhile, sources said the main preventive measure for suicide was curing depression by accepting it as a mental illness and decreasing the stigma so that people found it less discouraging to seek treatment.
Although Malta does not have robust figures for the rate of depression, it followed European trends with about 20 per cent of the population suffering an episode of severe depression at some point in their life.
The figures showed that not all overdoses were the result of illegal or controlled drugs.
In fact, one in six used over-the-counter headache tablets. A number of people even turned to hay fever medication to self-harm.
Contrary to popular belief, illegal drugs, such as heroin and cocaine, only accounted for a handful of the cases, similarly for sleeping pills.
However, sources believed this may be because those abusing illegal drugs were too scared to seek help at hospital because of the repercussions linked to such criminal activity.
Sources said there were also a high number of unintentional overdoses, although the Health Ministry did not provide information on this either.
In many cases, doctors could not tell whether the overdose was intentional or not. The main cause of accidental poisoning, they added, was paracetamol, although illegal drugs were also a major cause.