Cannabis is now the drug most likely to trigger mental illness in Scots, statistics show.

NHS Scotland has dealt with 3,700 new patients in the last three years suffering from a range of psychotic delusions and hallucinations linked to the drug.

For the first time, cannabinoids, the active compounds in the drug, are responsible for more fresh cases of psychiatric hospital admissions than any other drug. Experts say young people seem particularly at risk and warn against moves to relax the law around cannabis.

Psychiatric problems linked to cannabis have climbed since it was effectively decriminalised in Scotland in 2016. Admissions have increased by 68% in the wake of police deciding to hand out warnings to those caught with the drug for their own use.

Opioids – a class of narcotics that includes heroin – have previously been the drugs most likely to cause mental health problems. However, Public Health Scotland figures show cannabinoids are now responsible for 29% of new psychiatric admissions, compared with 26% for opioids. In the Western Isles, it is one in every two. And the figure has risen to 40% or more in Mid & East Lothian (49%), Fife (42%) and East Renfrewshire (40%).

For the third year in a row, more than 1,000 new inpatients were admitted with psychiatric problems caused by cannabinoids – a total of 3,693 since 2019/20. When the data was first compiled in 2006/07, the yearly figure was only 363.

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