- Home
- Administrative data
- Our research
- About us
- Contact us
- News and events
- BLOG - Access to secure data during the Covid-19 pandemic - a model for the future?
- Covid-19 and Care Homes: Advances in Administrative Data Research during the pandemic
- DATA INSIGHTS -Deprivation and informal care at the end of life
- NEWS - Innovative new residential linkage tool launched
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home- No.4
- DATA INSIGHTS - Youth Movements, Social Mobility and Health Inequalities
- NEWS - New report warns of deepening poverty crisis for Scottish families
- New report on Infants Born into Care in Scotland
- Spotlight on Dr Elizabeth Lemmon
- Spotlight on Jan Savinc
- BLOG - The value of social science and administrative data research in Scotland: how we are helping respond to COVID-19
- DATA INSIGHTS - Exploring illegal drug consignments in Scotland
- DATA INSIGHTS -Linking two administrative data sets about looked after children
- NEWS – ADR Scotland data ambassadors launched
- The importance of administrative data
- Virtual Conference - Data Linkage: Information to Impact
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home - No.7
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home- No.3
- DATA INSIGHTS - Investigating the effects of class composition and class size on pupils’ attainment in Scottish primary schools
- NEWS - New opportunity to join ADR Scotland’s Public Panel
- BLOG - Exploring the potential of synthetic data
- DATA INSIGHTS - Automatic Coding of Occupations: Methods to create the Scottish Historic Population Database (SHPD)
- DATA INSIGHTS - Selective schools: do they improve health?
- EVENT - Active Travel: New Data, New Insights
- EVENT - Holyrood Evidence Week: Doing Data Better for Policy and Public Good
- BLOG - Geospatial Ambitions
- BLOG - Taking historical death records and developing a database for future analysis
- DATA INSIGHTS - Community mortality due to Covid-19
- Future-proofing investment into administrative data research announced in Scotland
- NEWS - Understanding the dynamics of the nursing workforce: the potential of routinely collected data
- Spotlight on Katherine Falconer
- ADR Scotland publishes its strategy for 2022-2026
- BLOG: Developing a cross-national research agenda on crime and convictions
- BLOG: Working together to make a difference with data
- DATA INSIGHTS - Homelessness duration in Scotland: how long does rehousing take?
- DATA INSIGHTS - Occupation and COVID-19 deaths: Scotland in a comparative perspective
- DATA INSIGHTS -The health and economic benefits of active commuting in Scotland
- IPDLN Conference - Data linkage research: informing policy and practice
- Spotlight on Dr Evan Williams
- Spotlight on Fernando Pantoja
- Spotlight on Laurie Berrie
- ADR Scotland Winter Partnership Session - **internal event**
- BLOG - AGEING AND HOMELESSNESS IN SCOTLAND
- BLOG - Can we use linked administrative data to identify social disadvantage?
- BLOG - Commuting and its impact on health
- BLOG - The Dynamics of the Nursing Workforce in the UK: Using data to support our nurses
- BLOG: Growing up in kinship care
- DATA INSIGHTS - Analysing a season of death and excess mortality in Scotland’s past
- EVENT - ADR UK Virtual Half Day event
- Event - Public data for public good: towards better understanding children's lives
- NEWS - Data research initiative secures £90 m funding extension
- NEWS: Our role supporting the new Covid-19 research data service in Scotland
- Spotlight on Michelle K Jamieson
- Webinar - An Introduction to Looked-After Children Dataset
- BLOG - An Inside Job: Using Criminology, Police Data and a Lot of Nouse
- BLOG - Improving justice data to promote data justice in Scotland
- BLOG - Location of death in 2020: a changing trend from hospitals to homes
- BLOG - Seeking feedback on Research Data Scotland’s core principles via our public panel
- BLOG - What skills, training and support are required by those wishing a career as an administrative data researcher?
- BLOG No. 9 - Final blog in this 'deaths at home' series
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home - No. 6
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home - No.8
- BLOG SERIES - Dramatic increase in deaths at home- No.5
- BLOG: 5 things I've learnt about working with policymakers...
- BLOG: Automating Coding for Large Historical Datasets
- BLOG: COVID-19- How increased deaths at home impact the carer community
- DATA INSIGHTS -Postal deliveries of drugs in Scotland
- EVENT - 'Getting things done with data in government'
- EVENT - Linking public sector data for research: an ADR UK showcase event
- EVENT Seminar - Administrative data for social policy research: potential and pitfalls
- NEWS - Additional funding for Understanding Children’s Lives and Outcomes
- NEWS - Engaging children and young people
- NEWS: Police use of Fixed Penalty Notices under the Covid-19 regulations in Scotland: A new data report highlights links with deprivation and inequality
- NEWS: Police use of the new Covid-19 powers: Using administrative data to analyse and evaluate practice
- Research Data Scotland - New user forum
- Spotlight on Dr Patricio Troncoso
- Summary of ADR Scotland Winter Partnership session
- Directorship of the International Population Data Linkage Network (IPDLN) for 2021-22.
- BLOG: In the light of experience: InterRAI and the final thousand days of life
- Multiple health conditions and social care
- NEWS - Susan McVie elected as Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences
- SCADR relocates to the Bayes Centre
- EVENT: Four day introduction to using administrative data for social and health research
- BLOG: The value of administrative data: DALYs and the Scottish Burden of Disease study
- BLOG: Where to start with parliamentary and policy engagement
- EVENT - International Conference on Administrative Data Research, Cardiff
- EVENT - Using data to realise the potential of the 'Last 1000 days'
- EVENT: TalkingData: ADR Scotland mini-summit
- EVENT: “Let’s use data to save time, money and lives”: ADR Scotland partners gather for mini-summit
- EVENTS: ADR Scotland researchers present at international conference in Cardiff
- SafePod Network
DATA INSIGHTS - Exploring illegal drug consignments in Scotland
This week, Research Fellows Fernando Pantoja and Ana Morales, share findings from their research exploring the motivation of postal drug deliveries and analysing the packages in relation to drug-related harm.
Project Overview
In recent years, the development of new technologies and particularly the internet, have facilitated the trading of drugs, prompting the move of some illegal markets from physical into online spaces.
Unlike a traditional drug transaction where the vendor usually delivers in person, the delivery of drugs purchased online remains deeply tied to postal distribution networks.
A great problem faced by law enforcement was that the same technologies that allow buyers and sellers of drugs to interact on the internet anonymously, make it extremely difficult to gather reliable data. This means that relatively little was known about many aspects of these markets, including:
- the characteristics of drug parcel destinations and the presence of clusters,
- the possible motivation of drug purchasers (in terms of self consumption or supply),
- and the relationship between law enforcement actions and indicators of potential drug-related harm.
In order to carry out research into these three areas highlighted above, the Illegal Drugs Consignment project was developed in collaboration with the National Crime Agency (NCA). The NCA provided information about all illegal consignments from overseas that were intended for delivery to Scotland and seized in the postal service by the UK Border Force between April 2011 and January 2016. This NCA dataset was also linked to spatial data from the 2011 Scottish Census and the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation in order to explore local characteristics of the destination of illegal consignments, particularly of those associated with drug use and its harm at the community level.
The potential benefits of exploring this dataset were enhanced by close collaboration with Police Scotland and other key stakeholders, including health services and local organisations.
Data Insights
Today we are delighted to share two further Data Insights relating to this project, alongside the first in the series which was published last year by Research Fellow, Ben Matthews, on the geography of postal drug deliveries in Scotland.
The first of the new Data Insights, published today, explores classifying the likely ‘motivation’ of online drug purchasers.
Fernando Pantoja's new research found that neighbourhood deprivation was strongly related to differences in the possible motivation of drug purchase. Parcels that were destined for addresses in the 20% most deprived communities of Scotland were most likely to be motivated by heavy use or social dealing, while parcels that were destined for addresses in the 20% least deprived communities were most likely to be motivated by personal consumption.
Our second Data Insights examines supporting law enforcement decision making around illegal drug parcels and the wider implications for drug-related harm in communities.
Ana Morales's research found that packages that posed a higher level of harm, in terms of type and quantity of drugs contained, were more likely to be selected for a controlled delivery by law enforcement agencies. However, controlled deliveries were not associated with wider community level harms such as community vulnerability and problematic drug use. This study suggests that the selective targeting of controlled delivery by law enforcement agencies may be improved by considering the potential risks associated with both the parcel itself and the characteristics of the area to which it is destined. This would be in line with a public health approach to reducing drug-related crime and its associated harms on individuals and communities.
Further Information
In addition to these Data Insights, learn more about our research exploring illegal drugs supply in Scotland on the project webpage or view the NCA Dataset Description here.
This article was published on 11 Feb 2021