ANOTHER national newspaper has highlighted the rate of drug-related deaths in Barrow.

The i has followed other publishers which at the beginning of this month reported on new figures from Public Health England.

The recently-published figures, which relate to deaths in 2016, make for grim reading.

In 2016 Barrow the ninth highest rate with 4.9 heroin misuse deaths per 100,000 but other towns had much higher rates.

In 2016 there were 14 deaths per 100,000 in Blackpool, 7.6 in Burnley, and 6.5 in Hastings.

The i's headline is "Barrow-in-Furness: one of the UK’s coastal towns where drug related deaths are now the norm" but is this a fair summing-up of Barrow? Do you think drug-related deaths in our town are now the 'norm'?

The article includes emotive language such as in the phrases "the drug problem runs deeper here than the mudflats surrounding the Furness Peninsula" and includes police log figures obtained by The Mail in January 2017 about the number of call-outs to Egerton Court.

Those figures show that between 2011 and 2014, the total number of call-outs each year rose from 172 to 207 to 297 to 312. And yet, from then on, the figures have seen a sharp and continued decrease.

In 2015, police call-outs dropped by more than 100 from the previous year - down to 194. And the following year, the trend continued.

The i's article describes how vulnerable residents are being targeted by drug dealers and find it "impossible to leave" Egerton Court once they move in.

It also claims few of those who live at Egerton Court "can hope to gain employment" at the shipyard which, as with The Sunday Times recently, is not backed up by any statistics, evidence or response from BAE Systems.

Is this fair to the hard-working, employed residents of Egerton Court?

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