DUBLIN CITY COUNCIL was contacted by members of the public on more than 200 occasions in the past two years over drug paraphernalia, such as used needles, which had been discarded on the streets of the capital.
Sources said hundreds more needles and items of drug litter were also collected by council staff who clean the streets around the city on a daily basis.
Businesses and tourists have raised concerns over the safety of the city due to the excessive number of discarded needles.
The locations of the discarded drugs paraphernalia were scattered across the city and varied from smaller less trafficked streets to popular shopping districts including Grafton Street and Henry Street.
In addition to the regular cleanups of areas around Dublin carried out at various times of the day by council street crews, figures released to TheJournal.ie that staff were also called out a dozen times to respond to reports of ‘hazardous material’ – a category that includes drug litter – on Essex Street in Temple Bar since the start of 2018.
Source: Conor McCrave, The Journal.ie, 4th January 2020