“If trying to save lives is a crime,” Peter Krykant once proudly told journalists, “I’m guilty”. Last week, he was found dead at his home in Falkirk. Best known for converting a second-hand van into an unofficial mobile drug consumption room, the 48-year-old campaigner was one of the most recognisable faces in Scotland’s ongoing drug debate. Police say his death is currently being treated as unexplained, pending a post-mortem, the results of which will show whether his death was merely tragic — or devastatingly ironic.
Krykant spent the last five years of his life campaigning for radical drug reform. His activism went beyond his previous calls for clean needles, safe spaces to inject, and softer-touch policing. Krykant, in the end, became something of an extremist, envisioning a world where addiction carried no stigma whatsoever; where the identity of “drug-user” could be worn with pride; and where obtaining and using powerful, addictive psychoactive substances was a simple matter of equality carrying no social or legal penalties. But he hadn’t always been that way. Something changed over the years, as his activist star soared. While many have already attempted to sum up Krykant’s legacy, as an intelligent and energetic campaigner, he was far more complex than that.
His life story was, and still is, compelling. A former addict who had once been on the streets, hospitalised with psychosis in his teens, he turned his life around. He secured a job, a family and a global community of friends and fellowship. In other words, Krykant seemed to be flourishing, and this was in large part due to his abstinence-based recovery — when you eschew all mood- and mind- altering substances with an understanding that addiction is an illness.
This contrasts with the prevailing treatment of harm-reduction which, among other things, involves managing addiction by prescribing less harmful substances or mitigating the health risks associated with using. Harm reduction saves and stabilises countless lives every day, but for some with severe cases of long-term addiction, it becomes a form of purgatory. When an addict of this extreme variety buys into the idea that they can, in some circumstances, safely use drugs — whether prescribed by a doctor or obtained on the street — it’s only a matter of time before the blue lights start flashing.
What many people don’t know about Krykant, because he edited much of his history when he embraced the harm-reduction philosophy that made him famous, is that he spent 11 years sober before he became a campaigner. His journey can be traced on social media, from when he began working in support services while firmly rooted in the 12-step model. It was at the height of Scotland’s drug death crisis, in 2019, that Krykant felt called to do more — publicly. He aligned himself with “You Keep Talking, We Keep Dying”, a campaign spearheaded by Anne Marie Ward, CEO of campaigning charity Faces and Voices of Recover, to push for urgent reforms in drug treatment and policy.
He turned up at Ward’s event in Glasgow, in a suit and tie and his finest game face. From the outset, those around him sensed that Peter was seeking not just policy change, but a highly visible platform from which to advocate for it. The long-deadlocked debate over safe consumption rooms offered him both. He sought, in his words, to move forward the “political football” on safe consumption, encouraging more thoughtful debate on the scourge of Scottish drug deaths — at that time and presently the worst in Europe.
As his campaigning grew, Krykant was likelier to be seen on the evening news than at the recovery meetings which had been the foundation of his sobriety. And in a bold, headline-grabbing move, he converted an old ambulance into a mobile drug-consumption facility, parking it on the streets of Glasgow and daring the authorities to intervene. The optics were powerful. But this wasn’t just a politically astute stunt: it was a heartfelt act of protest against inertia. Krykant argued that if official safe consumption sites weren’t allowed, then people were going to die wretchedly in alleyways, stairwells — or alone in their homes.
His actions helped drag the issue into the political mainstream, forcing formerly suspicious tabloids to adopt a softer editorial tone on drug addicts. All this also earned Krykant international recognition. He became, in effect, the poster boy for harm reduction, an ally for canny operators across the harm-reduction space, always keen to publicise their work by platforming others who had “lived it”.
Peter Krykant’s activism, particularly his unsanctioned overdose prevention van, helped push Scotland toward officially piloting the UK’s first drug consumption room, reframing drug policy as a public health issue. His work legitimised lived-experience voices in policymaking, and accelerated national debate on harm reduction and decriminalisation. Whatever your view on this issue, and there are many, nobody can ever take that away from him.
But — don’t I know it — this platform comes with risks. Those close to Krykant knew the truth: he had relapsed not long after launching his van, using the same drugs as the people he was trying to help. This was an open secret among politicians, charity workers, and journalists, as well as many of us in the recovery community. When dealing with addicts in relapse, it’s not always clear what the best course of action is.
“Those close to Krykant knew the truth: he had relapsed not long after launching his van.”
The waters run all the muddier because addicts, by our very nature, become secretive and dishonest out of shame and fear. Krykant didn’t owe everyone every detail of his life. But having been put on a pedestal for his immense efforts, being honest about his own struggles would have been that much harder. The few who raised concerns, particularly from abstinence-based recovery communities, were dismissed as bitter, jealous, or out of step with the “progressive” mood. It felt almost taboo to publicly point out that Krykant was in danger, and even more futile to challenge him behind the scenes.
All the while, those close to Krykant watched as his ideology shifted from moderate to unhinged. I’d even argue that his addiction took his politics hostage: the more visible he became, the more absent he was in his private life and community. In the early days, he still spoke of the need for detox beds, for wider pathways into recovery, and for a more thoughtful debate about the role of medication and abstinence. But as Krykant started obsessing over harm reduction — and became more dependent on the organisations that affirmed his experiences — his outlook changed. He became part of what one former friend described as the “drugs pride” brigade: people who didn’t just advocate for safety and support, but who recast active addiction itself as a valid, even empowering identity. This is the sort of idea that only someone in active addiction could adopt, and only those with no experience of it could affirm.
As Krykant struggled to reconcile the painful, humbling backslide into addiction with his new-found prominence, his broader politics became stranger too. He ran as an independent candidate for the Scottish Parliament, and when that failed, he began aligning with voices who, if they had their way, would see town centres and city streets lined with vending machines dispensing heroin and Valium. He adopted the language of “People Who Use Drugs” (PWUD) and “Person Who Injects Drugs” (PWID) — monikers that reframed destructive, home-wrecking compulsions as informed lifestyle choices. He blocked critics, even friends, and built a social media echo chamber that only told him what he wanted, needed, to hear.
Like it or not, Krykant’s best years were objectively spent in the rooms of 12-step fellowships. Yet he came not only to despise this method of sobriety, but to publicly condemn it and discourage others from trying it. This is a textbook relapse. In such a situation, the urge to create a face-saving justification for your descent back into addiction is strong. Krykant, sadly, had no shortage of backers willing to bolster whatever tall tale he required to justify his increasingly desperate circumstances. Along the way, he abandoned the belief system and community that had helped him stay clean for over a decade — a decision that would cost him his life.
Tributes have flowed since his death — from politicians, journalists, charities — each reaffirming the noble story: that Krykant battled for the marginalised, that he broke through political silence, that he cared. And all of that is true. But it is not the whole truth. These stories erase the part that matters most: the human cost of turning private pain into public performance, and the way a man who wanted to save lives slowly lost his own as his addiction became awkward for his gang of civic cheerleaders.
There are lessons here for everyone. For campaigners, a reminder of the dangers of building movements around individuals still in crisis. For journalists, a call to interrogate narratives rather than merely regurgitate them. For charities and funders, a warning against mistaking visibility for stability. And, for all of us, an invitation to tell more honest stories — about addiction, about recovery, and about the fine line between advocacy and exploitation.
Krykant’s legacy is assured, and he leaves Scotland’s drug debate in a far better place than he found it. While there was little we agreed towards the end, I was one of the people he reached out to for help when things took a bad turn a few years ago. And what he was pleading for back then was a rehab bed. He wanted to get sober. He understood what he suffered from and what he needed to get well. Along the way, though, something changed. Make of that what you will.
Krykant wanted so badly for his legacy to be about harm-reduction heroes and compassion for drug users. But what about those who amplified his message that using is a lifestyle choice — who encouraged his shift into activism and cast him as an expert on all things addiction while his private life collapsed? Did they show him real compassion and friendship of the sort that may occasionally involve a hard truth, some tough love, as opposed to vague platitudes and endless affirmation? Or did they exploit him, as a means to a political end, then run for cover when things headed south?
Luckily for them, but sadly for the rest of us, the whole truth likely died with Krykant. May he rest in peace. And may the rest hang their heads in shame.
