In the annual report that it published on Tuesday, 9 June, the European Union Drugs Agency (EUDA) has expressed its alarm at how increasingly complex and dangerous the drug market in Europe became in 2025.
Exposed to diverse substances that are already potent, European consumers are facing unprecedented health risks, particularly exacerbated by polysubstance use. The agency is now monitoring 1,050 new psychoactive substances (NPS), 50 of which were detected on the continent last year for the first time.
Synthetic opioids—often mixed with other drugs, which complicates emergency assistance—remain the leading cause of death, with at least 7,600 overdose deaths recorded in 2024.
In particular, the EUDA is worried about the spread of counterfeit medicines containing nitazenes, synthetic molecules that imitate real treatments such as painkillers or tranquillisers. Seizures of these tablets have skyrocketed, going from just 380 in 2022 to more than 50,000 in 2024. They affect young people who have no tolerance for these products.
At the same time, the traditional heroin market is holding up due to massive opium stocks from Afghanistan, which were estimated at 12,000 tonnes in 2025, while new cultivation areas, such as Pakistan (9,000 hectares) and Myanmar (45,000 hectares), are gaining ground.
Cannabis remains the most widely consumed substance, affecting 24.9 million adults in Europe. The EUDA indicates there was a mass arrival of North American stocks, notably via the ports of Rotterdam and Antwerp—which each seized 21 tonnes of cannabis in 2025. However, these products are sometimes contaminated with harmful pesticides that are not regulated in their regions of origin. Furthermore, the rise in synthetic cannabinoids, sold in the form of e-cigarettes or edibles, poses a risk of early addiction among adolescents.
With regard to cocaine, although the volumes seized fell from 419 tonnes in 2023 to 330 tonnes in 2024, the number of interceptions rose to 97,000 seizures. According to the agency, this demonstrates that drug traffickers are fragmenting their cargo to evade port controls while diversifying their methods (drones, semi-submersibles). Production is also being relocated within the EU itself, with 42 illicit laboratories dismantled in 2024.
Finally, ketamine is gaining ground particularly on the party scene: its use has thus increased in 40 European cities, leading to the number of admissions to specialised treatment quadrupling compared to 2019.
See the full report: https://aeur.eu/f/m8h (Original version in French by Justine Manaud)