Pubdate: Thu, 09 Aug 2001 Source: Sydney Morning Herald (Australia) Copyright: 2001 The Sydney Morning Herald Contact: http://www.smh.com.au/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/441 Source: Sydney Morning Herald (Australia) Author: Australian Associated Press Related: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v01/n1456/a03.html AUSTRALIA WON'T HAVE HEROIN TRIAL, SAYS GOVERNMENT Australia was unlikely to ever see a heroin trial, Health Minister Michael Wooldridge said today. Dr Wooldridge said new medical treatments were highly successful and law enforcement was also reducing the flow of drugs. "I don't think Australia will ever see a heroin trial," he told ABC radio. "I think it would be enormously controversial and I cannot see the medical benefits." A report by the National Crime Authority (NCA) recommended a heroin trial as a way of eliminating organised crime in the illegal drug trade. But Dr Wooldridge said the NCA was out of date. "I don't think there's any evidence that heroin would give any better treatment," he said. "I also know that as a doctor that things you do can make things worse as well as make things better. "You have to look at the supply side as well. There's no simple solution here, or no magic bullet." The Prime Minister, John Howard, reaffirmed his government's opposition to free heroin for drug addicts, saying that as long as he remained prime minister, heroin trials would not be held. "Claims we are losing the fight are not borne out by the evidence," he told Brisbane radio 4BC. He said figures showed a sharp decline in heroin deaths while police seizures of illegal drugs were higher. Mr Howard said free heroin trials in Switzerland had not been supported by the World Health Organisation. "We would not give any aid or comfort to any state that considered conducting free heroin trials," he said. Dr Wooldridge said federal laws meant any heroin trial - such as the one to be voted on in the ACT at a referendum later this year - could not get off the ground. "For a heroin trial to go ahead, it would need the commonwealth to change legislation to allow the importation of heroin," he said. "And we would not do that. So you wouldn't need to override it, it could not go ahead." Dr Wooldridge said he did not resile from his former comments about a trial. "In 1997 I perhaps had the view that we should try anything. We have data today that we didn't have in 1997. We now have access to treatment that we didn't have in 1997," he said. "I don't resile from what I said in 1997 and my colleagues took a different view, and in the past four years I think things have moved on." - --- MAP posted-by: Doc-Hawk