Illegal drug-related deaths in East Germany between 1995 and 2004.

The retrospective analysis determines changes between the deaths caused by illegal drugs in East Germany between 1995 and 2004 with specific regard to the number and manner of deaths, common intoxicants, concomitant drug use, the age and gender of the victims as well as the places of death. The data was collected by the institutes of forensic medicine in the German federal states of Saxony, Thuringia, Brandenburg, Mecklenburg West-Pomerania, Saxony-Anhalt and the State Offices of Criminal Investigation of these federal states. A comparison of these two different sources of data is also made. 510 drug-related deaths occurred in East Germany between 1995 and 2004. This was equivalent to a death rate of 0.4 per 100,000 inhabitants and represented 3% of all drug-related deaths throughout Germany. The average age of the victims was 24 years and male accounted for 85% of all the fatalities. Opiates, especially heroin, caused the majority of deaths (55%). Comparison of the two sources revealed that approximately half of the drug-related deaths were accounted for by national statistics. The analysis reveals an increase of drug-related deaths in East Germany after reunification but no relevant difference between the five East German states.