UK ‘the sick person of the wealthy world’ amid increase in deaths from drugs and violence

The UK is becoming “the sick person of the wealthy world” because of the growing number of people dying from drugs, suicide and violence, research has found.

Death rates among under-50s in the UK have got worse in recent years compared with many other rich countries, an international study shows.

While mortality from cancer and heart disease has decreased, the number of deaths from injuries, accidents and poisonings has gone up, and got much worse for use of illicit drugs.

The trends mean Britain is increasingly out of step with other well-off nations, most of which have had improvements in the numbers of people dying from such causes.

The increase in drug-related deaths has been so dramatic that the rate of them occuring in the UK was three times higher in 2019 – among both sexes – than the median of 21 other countries studied.

The findings are contained in a report by the Health Foundation thinktank, based on an in-depth study of health and death patterns in the 22 nations by academics at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM). “The UK’s health is fraying,” they concluded.

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Source: The Guardian, 20 May 2025