Brits more than doubled ketamine intake in 2024 with 25 tonnes consumed

Ketamine use in the UK has more than doubled in the space of a year as MPs decide whether to upgrade it to a class A drug.

New figures from the Home Office show almost 25tonnes of the drug, also known as K or Special K, was used in 2024 – up from 10.6tonnes the year before.

Right now ketamine is a much cheaper alternative to other party drugs like cocaine. The drug, also used as a horse tranquiliser, costs about £10 per gram while cocaine will cost more like £60 per gram.

The figures, seen by The Sun, comes from a study of wastewater treatment centres, which is where remnants of the drugs end up.

But while 855kg of ketamine was confiscated by police and Border Force in the 12 months to March 2024, with seizures increasing by more than 50% in a year, that equates to only 3% of the drug in circulation being seized when compared to usage figures.

Ketamine can either be injected as a liquid or snorted as a powder, and it distorts the user’s senses which can make them feel disassociated from their surroundings or in a dream-like state.

Medical research has found that twice-weekly injections could reduce the impact of severe depression – but that doesn’t change the fact that it can have serious health implications if taken long-term.

Severe bladder damage causing people to need the toilet every half an hour, damage to the short- and long-term memory, increased heart rate and blood pressure, and potentially even liver damage, could all come as a result of ketamine abuse.

Right now, supplying or producing ketamine will land you a prison sentence of up to 14 years, an unlimited fine, or both.

If it’s reclassified to a class A drug, putting it on the same level as heroin, cocaine, and LSD, supplying or producing it could result in a life sentence.

But there are concerns that changing ketamine’s classification is unlikely to stop people using the drug – and it may even make people less likely to seek help to treat their addiction.

Dr David Bremner, Medical Director at drug and alcohol support provider Turning Point said: ‘We support an increase in awareness of the dangers of ketamine use as we have seen an increase in the number of people seeking support and significant health complications associated with using this drug.

‘However, in our experience, criminalising drug use doesn’t stop people using them. Indeed, people may be more reluctant to seek help or advice which makes them more vulnerable to drug-related harm.

‘It is important to improve education on the damage ketamine use causes and the support that is available to those struggling.’

The review comes after a number of young people died or took their own lives after becoming addicted to ketamine.

Jamie Boland, 38, died of sepsis resulting from a kidney infection that was ‘a complication of long-term use of ketamine’.

Senior coroner Alison Mutch wrote in a Prevention of Future Deaths Report that he ‘had used cocaine a class A drug but had switched to ketamine, a class B drug, on the basis that he perceived it to be less harmful’.

And 26-year-old Rian Rogers, from Warwickshire, was found dead in a shower while on the waiting list to have his bladder removed due to the damage caused by his ketamine addiction.

An autopsy revealed his damaged bladder had shrunk to the size of a marble.

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