Pubdate: Wed, 24 Oct 2007
Source: Daily News, The (Newburyport, MA)
Copyright: 2007 Essex County Newspapers, Inc
Contact: http://plus.newburyportnews.com/ze/info/letterstotheeditor.htm
Website: http://www.newburyportnews.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/693
Author: Angeljean Chiaramida, Staff writer

'These Are Good Kids Making a Bad Choice'

PRESCRIPTION DRUG DEATHS ZERO IN ON ATHLETES, ONE-TIME USERS

Editor's note: This is the second part in a series on prescription 
drug abuse in the greater Newburyport area.

Police engrossed in the drug war admit the battle to stop 
recreational use of potentially deadly prescription drugs is 
different from the traditional campaign to stop the use of illegal 
drugs like heroin, cocaine and marijuana.

Police and legal officials in New Hampshire and Massachusetts agree 
the recreational use of prescription drugs among teens and young 
adults is more rampant and complex than most people believe. Seabrook 
police think prescription drugs are 90 percent of the town's drug problem.

In 2005 and 2006, there were at least 291 drug-related deaths in New 
Hampshire, according to statistics from the medical examiner's office 
provided by Assistant Attorney General Ann Rice. Although some deaths 
involved more than one drug, with alcohol often in the mix, 87 deaths 
were traced to abuse of the prescription drug methadone, 40 to 
oxycodone, 31 to diazepam, and 17 to fentanyl.

In Massachusetts, Steve O'Connell, spokesman for the Essex County 
District Attorney Jonathan Blodgett, said that as of this September, 
40 confirmed deaths from drug overdoses had been recorded this year 
in Essex County, and many more suspected drug deaths are awaiting 
toxicology reports to confirm the cause. Of the 40 known drug deaths, 
15 - or almost 38 percent - were confirmed prescription drug overdoses.

Law enforcement officials agree the escalating pattern of 
prescription drug abuse is frightening and proving very hard to stop.

To begin with, they said, those abusing prescription drugs don't fit 
the usual profile of drug addicts. They aren't primarily kids from 
poor or dysfunctional homes. They aren't disenfranchised youth living 
on the streets. They are high school athletes, college students and 
the kids next door.

After investigating three deaths involving a mix of prescription 
drugs and alcohol in one a six-month period in Seabrook in 2005, Det. 
Sgt. Michael Gallagher alerted The Daily News to the problem.

"Historically, when we were called to an overdose scene, we'd arrive 
to see an underweight, malnourished junkie who'd overdosed on heroin, 
usually with the needle still sticking into his arm," Gallagher said. 
"But when a kid is shooting hoops with his pals on the basketball 
court one day, and dead of an overdose of prescription drugs and 
alcohol the next, this is truly alarming."

"Big Swing"

Law enforcement officials can only speculate why this problem has 
surfaced. They believe people are taking prescription drugs to get 
high because they think they're safer and not as "dirty" as using 
heroin, crack cocaine, crystal methamphetamine or marijuana. The 
stigma of being a junkie doesn't seem to apply in their minds when it 
comes to abusing prescription drugs.

"There's been a big swing over the years away from heroin to 
prescription drugs," said Capt. Russ Conte of the N.H. State Police. 
"Maybe it's because kids think if you're going to use a 20 milligram 
oxycodone, at least you know it's from a pharmacy."

The change in Seabrook, for example, was relatively quick. In 2003 
and 2004, the war in Seabrook was against the use of heroin, which 
was cheap and abundant. Yet by 2005, Gallagher and others said, the 
trend began to change to prescription drug abuse. Currently, police 
believe prescription drugs are 90 percent of the drug problem in Seabrook.

Gallagher said that Lt. Kenneth Gill of the Essex County Drug Task 
Force and Lt. Terry Kineen, supervisor of New Hampshire State Police 
drug unit, the prescription drugs abused most often include diazepam 
(Valium); amphetamine-dextroamphetamine (Adderall prescribed for 
attention deficient disorder); hydrocodone (Vicodin); oxycodone 
(OxyContin, Percocet, Percodan); clonazepam (Klonopin); propoxyphene 
(Darvon); hydromorphone (Dilaudid); lorazepam (Ativan); fentanyl 
transdermal patches (Duragesic); and methadone wafers (synthetic morphine).

Used correctly, under the supervision of a physician, in the correct 
dosages and never in combination with alcohol, these drugs serve 
needed medical purposes.

Used incorrectly, they kill.

Dosages are critical because along with reducing pain or anxiety, 
these drugs depress the central nervous system to block the sense of 
pain, but as a side effect, they also depress respiration.

"You use too much, you stop breathing," said Salisbury police Chief 
David L'Esperance, who lost his son to a methadone overdose earlier this year.

Kineen and Gallagher said kids don't understand the critical 
importance of dosage when dealing with prescription drugs. Gallagher 
said kids are known to chew transdermal fentanyl patches, absorbing 
the dose all at once, but the patches are ment to be absorbed through 
the skin slowly over a three-day period.

OxyContin tablets are prescribed as time-release tablets that come in 
a variety of doses from 5 milligrams to 80 milligrams. They're 
prescribed only for those in severe, chronic pain, such as cancer 
patients. Yet recreational users and addicts take a shortcut to get 
the medication into their systems as quickly as possible - often with 
an alcohol chaser - to get high.

"Kids are crushing these tablets, which bypasses the time-release 
action of the pill," Kineen said. "Crushing rushes a huge amount of 
the drug into the bloodstream all at once. The side effect is a 
severe depression of respiration. Death can occur quietly after a single dose."

Affluent Families

On the street, these drugs command a high price, given what they cost 
at the pharmacy. Unlike heroin, which can be purchased for $5 to $10 
a bag, or a six-pack of beer, oxycodone sells on the street for $1 a 
milligram, L'Esperance said. Using that formula, the 80 milligram 
oxycodone pill costs about $80.

"Kids from affluent families are almost more at risk, more likely to 
get involved with prescription drug use," Gill said. "They're the 
kids with the money to pay $80 for oxycodone. They're the ones with 
the cars and transportation."

And being good students or athletes doesn't necessarily keep kids 
away from recreational use of prescription drugs, he said. A football 
player who downs an oxycodone with a beer at a Friday night party to 
get a great high and celebrate winning the big game would never even 
consider buying a bag of heroin, Gill said. That athlete probably 
looks down on the "druggie" who snorts or shoots heroin. But athletes 
might take an oxycodone pill or a methadone wafer as an adventure to 
have a little fun, Gill said. They think: What can it hurt? It's a 
legal drug, isn't it?

"These are good kids making a bad choice and ending up with a life 
decision," Gill said.

It doesn't take a lot to become addicted physically or 
psychologically to the euphoria these drugs create.

Gill gave a real-life example: former Peabody High star pitcher Jeff 
Allison, who ended up in jail in North Carolina in August instead of 
playing professional baseball in Florida for the Marlins. Allison is 
in jail because he couldn't break his overwhelming needed for 
oxycodone, which he began using in high school, Gill said.

"I think this kid got a $1.8 million bonus to sign with the Marlins," 
Gill said. "If you had walked up to him when he was in high school 
and said, 'Here, have some heroin,' I bet he would have told you, 
'Stay away from me with that filthy stuff.' But it was OK for him to 
take oxycodone. This kid could really throw the ball. He was a star. 
Now he's in some jail."

Allison's story is a tragedy of a talented kid making a bad choice 
that will haunt him for the rest of his life, Gill said.

Every expert interviewed for this article and series asked that the 
same message be conveyed: Parents who think they're kids are too 
smart, too careful, too scared or too well-brought-up to get involved 
with this drug trend need to think again, and they need to talk to 
their kids early and often.

[sidebar]

MOST ABUSED PRESCRIPTION DRUGS

* diazepam (Valium)

* amphetamine-dextroamphetamine (Adderall)

* hydrocodone (Vicodin)

* oxycodone (OxyContin, Percocet, Percodan)

* clonazepam (Klonopin)

* propoxyphene (Darvon)

* hydromorphone (Dilaudid)

* lorazepam (Ativan)

* fentanyl transdermal patches (Duragesic)

* methadone wafers (synthetic morphine)

Source: Lt. Kenneth Gill of the Essex County Drug Task Force and Lt. 
Terry Kineen, supervisor of New Hampshire State Police drug unit 
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