Alexis Goosdeel, the Director of the European Union Drugs Agency (EUDA), formerly the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction, presented, on Monday 30 September, his priorities to the MEPs of the European Parliament’s Committee on Civil Liberties and explained how his Agency intends to place itself even more at the service of the Member States.
The Agency’s remit has been extended in three areas: observation and surveillance, preparing the EU for new threats, and developing skills for better intervention.
It now also works to anticipate new challenges, warn of emerging risks, assess needs and contribute to the dissemination of new knowledge and evidence-based best practice.
The new EUDA will also be tasked with monitoring developments in polysubstance abuse. The Agency “is in the process of developing, with a solid surveillance system; the aim will be to better detect changes in the market, almost in real time”, explained Mr Goosdeel.
A new alert system for drugs on the European market is being put in place, with the Agency also planning to strengthen its data, evidence-based knowledge, scientific data and hospital data.
“We also need to work with the Member States to establish risk communication tools and carry out forward-looking analyses”, added the director.
He also sent a message and recalled the situation in the EU: “The Agency’s message is that drugs are accessible everywhere; our mission is to warn of emerging threats and to help legislators develop robust responses”.
Drugs on the European market have never been so “available, so powerful and so cheap”.
There have “never been so many substances produced on EU territory” with more than 450 illegal laboratories dismantled in 2022.
Mr Goosdeel highlighted as well the phenomenon of multiple drug use, although cannabis is the most widely used drug. There has also been an increase in the use of stimulants and psychoactive substances. To date, some 950 new synthetic products have been detected on the European drugs market. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)