Australia's Annual Overdose Report

The 2026 edition of Australia’s Annual Overdose Report makes for shocking reading.

In 2024, the number of drug-induced deaths in Australia reached the highest level ever recorded.

Nearly 2,600 people died. Unintentional drug-induced deaths surpassed 2,000 for the first time, reaching the highest rate in the 24-year data series.

These are not isolated increases. We are seeing records across multiple drug types and jurisdictions including the highest number of unintentional deaths involving heroin, cocaine and amphetamine type stimulants.

Victoria, Queensland, Western Australia and South Australia all recorded their highest number of unintentional drug-induced deaths in the time series.

The scale of these deaths is difficult to comprehend. Drug-induced deaths are among the leading cause of death for all Australians in their 20s, 30s and 40s. This is a crisis that reaches every part of Australian society, affecting people across generations, communities and circumstances.

Drug use patterns are changing. The harms are increasing. Yet too often, our response remains static.

The growing number of young people dying from cocaine-related deaths is particularly troubling.

The rise in deaths involving stimulants such as methamphetamine demands urgent attention. Nonfatal overdoses and hospitalisations involving emerging drugs such as GHB and ketamine are surging.

First Nations people continue to experience a disproportionately high burden of unintentional drug-induced deaths, a disparity that has widened even more sharply in recent years, and should be a national policy priority.

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