RESEARCH / VERSION 1.1 / 16 OCTOBER 2026
Social and economic harms, England 2017/18
PHE’s analysis places annual harms at £19.3bn.
| Field | Evidence |
|---|---|
| Reference period | 2017/18 |
| Coverage | England |
| Status | Published estimate |
| Source-check date | 2026-10-14 |
| Measure | Social and economic cost |
| Value | 19.3 GBP billion |
| Currency / price basis | Nominal/source-period prices; no CLA inflation adjustment |
| Publication date | 2020-02-27 |
| Reference period | 2017/18 |
| Substances covered | Illicit drugs |
| Method | Cost-of-harms analysis including crime, enforcement, deaths, treatment and prevention. |
| Estimate family | phe-costs-2017-18 |
| Relationship to other estimates | standalone |
| Earlier estimate repeated / parent | No parent link asserted |
| Uncertainty | No statistical confidence interval supplied in this record. |
Interpretation limits
Not consumer spending, government spending alone, profit, or GDP. Underlying PHE analysis unpublished; no uncertainty interval supplied.
Sources
- Dame Carol Black: Review of Drugs, evidence pack (Home Office/PHE analysis) — Slide 14 (PDF page 15)
Cite this record
Civil Liberties Action (2026). The illegal drugs economy: Social and economic harms, England 2017/18. Record economy-phe-2017-harms, version 1.1, 2026-10-16. https://cla-political-finance.copperchime4.chatgpt.site/databases/releases/2026-10-16-v1.1/records/economy/economy-phe-2017-harms.html
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