Hosted by the Center for Drug Use and HIV Research
Since 2019, nitazines have replaced fentanyl as the dominant unregulated opioid drug in Estonia, a northeastern European nation with a population of 1.3 million. The purpose of this presentation is to provide the timeline of the nitazene epidemic and the prevalence, patterns, and health consequences of nitazene use in Estonia. The presentation integrates a multi-faceted approach, encompassing administrative statistics, surveillance, and research data from 2019 to 2024. The quantitative data are complemented by qualitative interviews with nitazene users to provide nuanced and contextualized information.
Presented by Katri Abel-Ollo, who currently works as a researcher and thematic field leader in the Department of Drugs and Addictions at the Estonian National Institute for Health Development. She is also the head of the European Union Drugs Agency (EUDA) Estonian focal point. She leads several monitoring and research projects in the field of drug use. Her main research areas have been studies of risk behavior among injecting drug users, studies of syringe residues, studies of drug wastewater, and mapping and quality assessment of prevention, harm, addiction treatment, and rehabilitation services. Over the years, she has been involved in the preparation of many strategic documents in the fields of illicit drugs and infectious diseases.