Police data: Queenstown now the Cocaine Capital of NZ

Water test results for drugs in Queenstown appear to break all records

New data from the National Drug Intelligence Agency shows an explosion of cocaine use in Queenstown.

The data is collected from wastewater and covers around 75% of the national population.

The latest data is from March 2025 with Queenstown recording 656 mg/day/1000 people, compared to a national average of 195 mg/day/1000.

The highest non-Queenstown/national cocaine use figure in the national data is 222 mg/day/1000 people in September 2024.

• Queenstown skews the test results for the whole Southern catchment area - making it the highest cocaine use territory in New Zealand, by almost 50%.