Far more people in the Kirkcaldy area are being admitted to hospital because of drug and alcohol abuse than across Fife as a whole.
New figures released by the Fife Alcohol and Drug Partnership show that Kirkcaldy has a 66% higher rate of drug-related hospital admissions than the Fife average.
It also has 28% more people admitted due to alcohol misuse.
The figures for alcohol-related illness at just under 800 per 100,000 of the population compared with the Fife average of slightly more than 600 are actually lower than six years ago.
However, drug-related admissions at just more than 250 per 100,000, compared with a Fife-wide figure of slightly more than 150, have increased and shot up by 80% between 2010/11 and 2012/13.
The increase for Fife was 50% over the same period.
MSP David Torrance described the Kirkcaldy figures as frightening.
“There has been a huge increase in a number of issues relating to drugs and alcohol,” he said.
“It’s something the Scottish Government and Fife Council are going to have to look seriously at, either putting in additional resources or changing the priorities of the resources they already have.”
A report by Louise Bowman, policy officer with Fife Alcohol and Drug Partnership (ADP) will be considered by members of the council’s Kirkcaldy area committee.
While outlining the number of people affected by drug and alcohol misuse, Ms Bowman’s report also highlights the amount of work in the area in a bid to combat the problem.
More than 4,400 people across Fife more than 1,000 of them from Kirkcaldy sought help from specialist support services in 2013/14, including 36 children affected by their parents’ misuse.
In addition, children’s charity Barnardo’s has been delivering a substance misuse education programme in schools over the past year and has reached an audience of 4,000 primary and 8,000 secondary pupils.
More recently, Fife Council has approved funding of £50,000 to the ADP to provide residential rehabilitation places for people from the region.
NHS Fife’s alcohol-related brain damage service, successfully piloted in Levenmouth, has now been rolled out to central and west Fife and the number of recovery and support groups is increasing.
Ms Bowman said: “There is growing research evidence stressing the importance for recovery communities in addition to treatment services…
“There are a range of recovery communities in Kirkcaldy that provide support through therapeutic peer support models or community-based activities.”
Mr Torrance added: “We need to educate people about the dangers of drug and alcohol abuse and the younger they are when we do that, the more successful we are.
“There is an awful lot of good work going on out there by groups trying to combat this.
“The statistics showing how many people are hospitalised through drugs and alcohol are quite frightening though and I find them very disappointing reading.”