DUNCAN Campbell (Opinion, December 6) gives a good summary of the harm minimisation approach to drugs. This view says that drug abuse will always be with us, so let's try to make it safer. It also says that any attempt to ban such substances is doomed to failure. However, the harm minimisation approach is a defective and defeatist policy that exists through the perpetuation of myths and misinformation. Consider the "banning doesn't work" mentality. Prohibition, Campbell informs us, has failed. Has it? During Prohibition in the US, consumption of alcohol declined substantially, as did the cirrhosis death rate for men (cut by two-thirds between 1911 and 1929), and arrests for public drunkenness dropped 50 per cent between 1919 and 1922. [continues 697 words]
THE opiates, cannabis and heroin, if pure, are safe and gentle drugs (heroin was used in childbirth before its ban in the 1950s), with little hangover; they are non-toxic producing passive peaceful behaviour. Alcohol, even if pure, is toxic and causes irreversible permanent brain and body damage (of liver, heart, pancreas, kidneys amongst other organs, and the foetus), with boorish aggressive behaviour. The outlawing of the opiates has nothing to do with pharmacological harm but is due to authoritarian religious puritanism. In Holland in 1996 I have read there were 37 heroin deaths, mostly foreigners, probably too scared to ring for an ambulance. In Australia in 1996 the heroin deaths were 642. Dean R. Bowling, Glenelg East, SA [end]
The Truth Is Plain: Legal Alcohol Is Our Deadliest Drug FEW Australians will speak comfortably of drugs because to do so is to include themselves in the ranks of the mind-altering or psychotropic drug-takers. Fewer still worry that the alcohol industry pushes its products in ways prejudicial to drinkers, particularly the young. The latest industry profits attributed to excessive alcohol consumption gave added point to Natasha Bita's exposure (Opinion, November 15) of the dangerous directions the advertising push is taking. [continues 652 words]
ECSTASY tester kits have become the latest tool of the chemical generation to determine the quality of the illegal drugs taken at nightclubs and parties.Hailed as quick, simple and legal, the kits tell users if pills contain MDMA (pure ecstasy) or other additives such as heroin and amphetamines. The kits are promoted on an internet site that rates ecstasy varieties such as White Mitsubishis according to content, quality and effect. "Looks like a nice professional job . . . Users report a speedy, dancey, chatty pill," the site, which is not written by the kit's manufacturers, says of one pill. [continues 376 words]
DRUG runners are sneaking into Australia from Papua New Guinea to exchange cannabis for firearms, alcohol and even pornographic videos, the Australian Federal Police has warned.In a submission to a parliamentary inquiry investigating Coastwatch, AFP officials said the smugglers believed the civil surveillance authority did not operate at night. The AFP has recommended a boost to night operations involving aircraft, Customs service boats and special response teams. After an eight-hour journey to Cape York by boat, police said smugglers loaded the cannabis into light aircraft or four-wheel-drive vehicles for transportation further south =AD a journey easily completed under cover of darkness. [continues 262 words]
A bungled 1997 drug raid on a hippy commune has cost the NSW Police Service more than $1 million in damages. District Court judge Audrey Balla yesterday awarded 24 members of the Wytaliba alternative community, near Glen Innes in northern NSW, damages of between $10,308.49 and $214,749.11 each, after they sued police for carrying out a two-day raid on their property without a search warrant. The court heard that community members were first alerted to the police raid when a low-flying helicopter appeared above the property and about 12 police, who had set up a mobile centre outside the commune, swooped on to the grounds. [continues 364 words]
ALEX WODAK claimed in his letter that there were no drug overdose deaths in the Swiss heroin trial. Wrong. Of the 1146 starters 36 died -- 17 from AIDS and other infectious diseases; the rest from a mix of overdose, suicide and accidental drug cocktails. Them's the facts -- like the fact that shooting galleries are just what the doctor ordered for street drug sellers. The sellers' buyers still buy at, what? $500 per day per habit? -- shoot up and come back and rebuy. Not smart. In fact probably quite dumb. [continues 172 words]
I WISH to thank Dr Alex Wodak for his support of the Australian National Council on Drugs position paper on heroin overdose (Letters, 14/9). The federal Government's Tough on Drugs strategy was begun less than two years ago and it takes time for it to be fully implemented and for the results to become apparent. The Tough on Drugs strategy has provided $500 million to Australian services to combat the drug problem: research projects; new and expanded treatment services; education and other prevention programs; extended needle exchange and methadone programs; family support services; expanded police and customs services; the court diversion services; and indigenous programs. [continues 322 words]
Aboriginal leaders have stepped up calls for John Howard to boost indigenous health funding in the wake of a spate of heroin overdoses in Canberra.Ten per cent of Canberra's Aboriginal community, including children as young as 10 years old, are using heroin, according to a report released yesterday. Three young Aboriginal men have died in the past month, prompting a call from the Canberra-based Aboriginal health service Winnunga Nimmityjah for immediate action on indigenous health. The service's chief executive, Julie Tongs, said yesterday the deaths of two men in their 20s, and a teenager, showed that pleas for aid were being ignored by territory, state and federal governments. [continues 181 words]
HEROIN users may be given the revival drug naloxone to treat overdoses in their peers as part of a new national push to curb drug deaths. The move comes as the federal Government is reconsidering subsidising the heroin-craving blocker drug naltrexone for heroin users in response to new research supporting its effectiveness. The Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy, made up of national health ministers, is considering a trial of naloxone, marketed as Narcan, in light of the continuing toll of heroin deaths, which has topped 1000 per year. [continues 280 words]
A MAGISTRATE has been appointed to Western Australia's first drug court to establish the structure of the new institution. Barrister and solicitor Julie Wager would take up the post on October 3, beginning her term by working out the day-to-day processes of the court, WA Attorney-General Peter Foss said yesterday. The drug court initiative was announced earlier in the year as a preventative measure intended to minimise drug use and crime by professional treatment and other support. [continues 99 words]
It is disappointing and frustrating to read the comments about supervised injecting places made by the International Narcotics and Control Board (11/7). They highlight the misunderstanding of the reasons for establishing these facilities in the first place. Supervised injecting places the board says, "will not contribute to the reduction of drug abuse and trafficking". That is not the objective. In the case of supervised injecting facilities, the objectives are clear: to save the lives of those who inject drugs in public places and to provide them with access to treatment and other support services; to provide a safer environment for everyone, with reduced risks such as discarded needles or inappropriate behaviour in public. These objectives can be measured. [continues 104 words]
JOHN KERIN reported that the International Narcotics Control Board is not happy with Australia's "all-in strategy combining the fight against legal with illicit drugs". Surely society should be concerned with drug abuse regardless of the legal status of the drugs involved. The INCB's view that abuse of alcohol is somehow different to abuse of heroin is not only anachronistic but hypocritical in the extreme. Dr MICHAEL DAWSON Senior Lecturer Department of Chemistry, Materials and Forensic Science University of Technology, Sydney [end]
Surely society should be concerned with drug abuse regardless of the legal status of the drugs involved. The INCB's view that abuse of alcohol is somehow different to abuse of heroin is not only anachronistic but hypocritical in the extreme. Dr MICHAEL DAWSON, Senior Lecturer Department of Chemistry, Materials and Forensic Science University of Technology, Sydney [end]
Prominent Melbourne lawyer Andrew Fraser was committed to stand trial yesterday over the importation of cocaine after a court was told he used secret phone codes to arrange drug deals and procured cocaine for a friend.The 49-year-old criminal lawyer, whose former clients include Alan Bond, will remain free on bail and continue to practice until his County Court trial later this year. At the committal hearing in the Melbourne Magistrates Court yesterday, self-confessed cocaine addict and disgraced forensic psychologist Tim Watson-Munro told how he and Fraser used football metaphors to talk about drugs on the telephone. [continues 294 words]
A HIGH-level UN committee has condemned Australia's $500 million anti-drug effort for failing to curb abuse and trafficking and making illicit drug abuse more socially acceptable. In a damning assessment of Australia's harm minimisation strategy, the International Narcotics Control Board says it has failed to reduce drug abuse and trafficking over the past decade. It warns that promoting an all-in strategy combining the fight against legal drugs such as alcohol and tobacco with illicit drugs leads to illicit drug use becoming more "socially acceptable". [continues 303 words]
ACT Chief Minister Kate Carnell has pulled out of a delegation of Australian leaders travelling to London and has threatened to call a snap election to break the impasse over her Budget.Ms Carnell was due to travel to Britain this week to join John Howard and other state and territory leaders for the Centenary of Federation celebrations. But she is now expected to continue negotiations with Independent MPs this week. Ms Carnell said on Saturday she would go to the polls within four weeks if she was unable to convince either Labor or two Independents to pass her minority Government's $1.6 billion Budget. [continues 338 words]
PRIVATE clinics claiming to offer a "magic cure" for heroin addiction using Naltrexone should be subject to government regulation, the inquest into Australia's first Naltrexone-related death was told yesterday. Coroner John Arms found the death of 31-year-old addict Larissa Hawkins was caused by a reaction to either the Naltrexone or Narcan administered at a private hospital. He criticised the doctors responsible for the fatal treatment early last year, and the case will be referred to the Health Care Complaints Commission for further investigation. [continues 180 words]
COMMUNITY opposition would not stop the Victorian Government pushing ahead with legislation to establish safe injecting room trials, Steve Bracks said yesterday.As advocates of a proposed facility in Footscray accused one community group of scaremongering over the issue, the Premier said his Government would "have the courage of our convictions", even if it meant losing votes. "Votes aren't the issue here - if it becomes unpopular but it is the right thing to do, we will do it," he said. His comments followed a heated public meeting in Footscray at the weekend, during which local Labor MP Bruce Mildenhall was shouted down as he attempted to outline the Government's proposed legislation on injecting rooms. [continues 207 words]
FIVE years ago, Cadbury marketing director Tim Stanford decided it was time to change the image of a tired, two-decade-old lollipop. He took a gamble and decided to expose the colourful children's Chupa Chup to the notoriously fickle teenage market. So when Anthony Mundine, the bad-boy of rugby league, announced his retirement while sucking on a Chupa Chup last month, Stanford knew the punt had paid off: the 40 cent lollipops - now as common in nightclubs as delicatessens - had the "it" factor among the hard-to-impress Generation X. [continues 805 words]
THE nation's top police officer has attacked plans by three governments to open heroin injecting rooms, warning they will send mixed messages to police and fail to save the lives predicted.Australian Federal Police Commissioner Mick Palmer warned yesterday that the implications of injecting rooms, due to open within months in Victoria, NSW and the ACT, had not been fully analysed - and could lead to unforeseen liabilities for governments. He said heroin use was being presented as just another drug option for Australian youths and too much prominence had been given to injecting rooms as a solution. [continues 323 words]
LEGISLATION to establish heroin injecting rooms heads into parliament this week, increasing pressure on the Opposition to declare its hand on the proposed trials. Until now, Opposition health spokesman Robert Doyle has refused to support or reject the experiment, saying his side of politics would decide a position only once draft legislation was on the table. While the Government will present its proposals this Thursday, a detailed response from the Opposition is still several weeks away. Doyle plans to take the issue to a retreat scheduled for all Opposition MPs during the winter parliamentary recess. That's when they will hear from David Penington, head of the Government's drug policy advisory committee, and debate the merits of the proposal. [continues 317 words]
AUSTRALIAN power companies say they are losing $120 million a year through electricity theft and blame the rise on the growing popularity of hydroponic marijuana cultivation. Backed by police reports and its own data, the industry's watchdog says hydroponic marijuana crops, propagated indoors through a system of lights and heat, were now the fastest-growing area of power-pinching in the country. Australasian Utilities Revenue Protection Association chairman David Weston said some companies were now attributing more than 20 per cent of all electricity thefts to hydroponics. [continues 239 words]
THE National Party in Victoria had only itself and its former leader, Pat McNamara, to blame for last weekend's shock by-election loss in Benalla, party heavyweight Peter McGauran said yesterday. As the Victorian Nationals gathered to discuss splitting from the Liberals, the party's most senior Victorian federal MP said severing ties would serve no purpose. He said the by-election loss was a voter backlash against Mr McNamara's decision to quit politics. "Of course Pat McNamara should have stayed . . . because people will punish any political party whose members are seen to take them for granted and just to use them for their own convenience," said Mr McGauran. "We've paid a heavy price for having a by-election." [continues 352 words]
THE Fitzroy birthplace of Mary MacKillop, Australia's likely first saint, will be converted into a drug counselling and support centre, the Catholic Church said yesterday. Catholic Archbishop of Melbourne George Pell said yesterday the centre would serve as a permanent memorial to Mary MacKillop's work among the distressed and dispossessed. The announcement came as Dr Pell released the report of the church's Archdiocesan Drugs Task Force, which has been investigating drug abuse in Melbourne. Dr Pell said the task force had identified a "dearth" of specialist family-directed drug and alcohol services in Victoria. [continues 166 words]
THERE is a pressing need for a trial of medically prescribed heroin, rather than safe injecting rooms, NSW Director of Public Prosecutions Nicholas Cowdery said last night. Mr Cowdery said the "Olympic circus" in Sydney had delayed the introduction of the heroin injection room trial in NSW. "Twelve months after the drug summit, and probably hundreds of deaths later, we are little closer to the commencement of operations of a supervised injecting place," he said. "The difficulties being encountered in this area highlight the irrationality of having supervised injecting places, but unsupervised and decidedly unsafe and unlicensed supply of drugs. [continues 178 words]
Addicts are being chained to their beds and drug dealers jabbed with needles in Russia’s desperate war against narcotics, reports Mark Franchetti in Yekaterinburg LESS than a fortnight ago, heroin was the only thing on Stanislav’s mind. A drug addict for five years, he spent his time roaming the streets of Yekaterinburg, 1500km east of Moscow, breaking into homes and robbing people to pay for his next fix. Twice he tried to break free of the addiction, but each time he injected himself only hours after leaving hospital. He may find it less easy to discharge himself a third time, however, daunt, bale and with sunken eyes, Stanislav, 21, is handcuffed to his bed, along with 16 other young addicts, as part of a drug rehabilitation program whose harsh methods have caused controversy across Russia. [continues 592 words]
DOCTORS Fleming and Pike are using information from the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction to claim that Dutch drug policy leads to some unpalatable consequences (Letters, 17/4). However, their reading of the available statistical information does not do sufficient justice to the results of our approach. Most importantly, drug-related deaths in The Netherlands are extremely low when compared with our European partners such as France, German, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom. In 1997, 65 people died of drug-related causes in a population of 15.5 million people. In Australia, with a slightly higher population, the corresponding number is more than 650. [continues 210 words]
POLITICIANS should defer to local communities over whether to allow trials of heroin injecting room in Victoria, the Australian Drug Foundation said yesterday.Geoff Munro, who heads the foundation's Youth Drug Studies Centre, said MPs who voted against the trial of injecting facilities were denying local communities the right to choose how they tackled the issue. "Ultimately, politicians should allow the communities in the most drug-affected areas to decide," he said. "It is they who have to cope with the drug-use on their streets and the worst effects. [continues 358 words]
VICTORIAN Premier Steve Bracks indicated yesterday he was willing to compromise on a plan to trial five heroin-injecting rooms, as Coalition opposition mounted.Mr Bracks said he would discuss any alternatives developed by the Liberal Party, including fewer trial facilities. "We'd look at any sensible proposal the Liberal Party wanted to discuss - looking for support from the Liberal Party means they have input as well," the Premier said. He ruled out any prospect the Government would seek to establish the drug trial without legislation if it could not win the support of the Opposition - a move that would require police agreement to not arrest users near the injecting rooms. [continues 294 words]
THE optimistic account of the impact of injecting rooms in The Netherlands, and commending of the "Dutch model" of drug law reform ("A room of their own", Features, 5/4) is misplaced. Proponents of drug law reform in this country, including those who advocate injecting rooms, have projected an image of the Dutch situation that betrays a selective blindness to the reality of the drug problem in The Netherlands. The following facts from well-researched and reputable sources (Tbe European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction, www.emcdda.org) illustrate the unpalatable consequences of the liberal drug policy in The Netherlands. [continues 261 words]
Three heroin treatment drugs will be trialled in jails in Australia for the first time. Inmates who became drug-clean might also get special treatment in parole hearings, NSW Minister for Corrective Services Bob Debus announced yesterday. Three heroin treatment drugs - naltrexone, buprenorphine and LAAM - will be trialled from early next year at three NSW correctional centres. Mr Debus said the programs were an attempt to "stop the cycle of drug abuse and crime". He said nearly 70 per cent of prisoners in NSW were jailed because of drug-related crime and a solution was needed to break the cycle. [continues 260 words]
Independents Face A Legal Minefield In Drug-Testing Students INDEPENDENT schools proposing to conduct drug tests must be mindful of inevitable legal challenges. Drug-testing cannot be viewed as a punitive measure. It also should not be seen in any way as a primary means of dealing with a problem, but only as part of an overall supportive regime. It should be the last option. Careful thought must be given to the processes to be followed. It would be prudent for schools proposing drug testing: to have a full and detailed policy in place that must be. If approved by the school council: to avoid random drug tests; to use drug testing. only as agreed, as part of a, program of rehabilitation and counselling entered into voluntarily by the student and their parents or guardians: the policy be meticulous. and every school must ensure that there is procedural fairness; documentation needs to be completed and maintained: confidentiality must be rigidly enforced. [continues 539 words]
Safe Injecting Rooms Save Young Lives The Uniting Church is being condemned for providing shooting galleries in Sydney and Melbourne. Church and health workers devoted to stopping an average of three Australian deaths daily from drug overdose are vilified publicly by vigilantes intolerant of the victims and ignorant of the remedies. There is a viciousness to this talk of shooting galleries which should disappear from the drugs debate. This is the propaganda language of the war on drugs, zero tolerance, in the mouths of those who fear harm minimisation. [continues 523 words]
MAKING a significant contribution to many a gross national product, the international drug trade turns over $1 trillion per annum. That doesn't count the billions of dollars spent on the policies of prohibition and interdiction, let alone the costs of incarceration. Grieving over the killing of a young colleague, a police officer in Vancouver, Canada, tries to put US president Ronald Reagan's "war on drugs" into perspective: "He died because of a small amount of powder used by consenting adults." [continues 529 words]
I WISH John Howard had disclosed that he was conscripting me into the Salvation Army when I didn't vote for him. Major Watters's variation on the loyalty test tends towards a House unAustralian Activities Committee (are you now, or have you ever been a liberal?) A New Zealand MP suggested drug tests in the Beehive, in response to another 's comment that parliament was drunk in charge of a country. Someone on this side of the ditch suggested drug tests as a condition of entry to the nursery and suddenly the air is thick with challenges. Get stock in the company that makes analysis kits -- we're having a urine-led recovery. Rick Langtree, Charters Towers, Qld [end]
THE reaction — especially by politicians — to the call for random drug tests among our public servants (20/3) speaks volumes. Given that such tests are quick and harmless, why the resistance? If our politicians are living drug-free lives, such tests should present no problem. All the talk of "invasion of privacy" is beside the point. If an elected representative is using illicit drugs, the public has a right to know. And if he or she is not, they should be quite eager to let this be known. [continues 70 words]
Bill Muehlenberg asserts (Letters, 21/3) that porn-viewing, drug-taking politicians may let their attitudes influence their votes on legislation regarding these issues. Maybe. Non-porn viewing, non-drug taking politicians would never let their attitudes influence their votes; they agree with Mr Muehlenberg and are correct thinking. Big Brother is getting closer. Graham Parker Fullarton, SA [end]
Teachers will be taught to recognise signs of drug taking, as part of the federal Government's $275 million campaign to combat illicit substances in schools. Health Department research, released by parliamentary Secretary for Education Trish Worth yesterday, shows 84 per cent of parents turn to teachers when they perceive a child has a drug problem. Up to 75 per cent also consult their general practitioner. But the research also reveals concerns among teachers and general practitioners of a "knowledge gap" particularly about newer party drugs. [continues 134 words]
A CALL for compulsory drug testing of public servants on the basis that liberalisation policies were motivated by personal drug use was an "extraordinary and cheap slur", a drug expert said yesterday. The Salvation Army's Brian Watters, who was appointed by the Prime Minister to chair the Australian National Council on Drugs, had earlier called for federal and state civil service contracts to make provision for random but mandatory testing of urine and, if necessary, blood. He further urged politicians to volunteer for drug tests, as he had himself once done - and would do again "any day, any time" - because "I should be above suspicion and be able to demonstrate I'm living a drug-free life". [continues 330 words]
THE number of Australians who tried heroin jumped 50 per cent in the three years from 1995 to 1998, according to the latest snapshot on crime.The youngest person recorded as using the drug was only 14, the Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence figures show. More than 100,000 people tried heroin at least once in 12 months. Those most likely to use the drug were men aged between 20 and 39. Despite record seizures, police are concerned that heroin is gaining in acceptance. The report also says more women are now using the drug. [continues 313 words]
MORE than 80 per cent of children whose deaths could be linked to their parents' drug abuse were known to NSW government authorities before they died, a report has found.The NSW Child Death Review Team revealed that 86 children of drug-dependent families had died over the past 31/2 years, 70 of whom had appeared on the Department of Community Service's records. In response, the state Government said yesterday it was planning to force parents with a history of drug and alcohol abuse to take drug tests as a condition of keeping their children. [continues 318 words]
How prescient of National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre researcher Jo Kimber to observe that the feeling in most supervised safe injecting rooms in Europe is "positive rather than negative" (Features, 25/2). Much the same has been true of supervised safe-ingesting rooms in Australia for decades, only we call them pubs. E. D. Webber, Blue Haven, NSW [end]
Safe Injecting Rooms For Drug Users Are Successful In Europe. Sian Powell Looks At How The Idea Could Work Here. EARLY in the frosty winter morning a crowd begins to gather outside Niddestr 49, an anonymous building in downtown Frankfurt. Stamping their feet on the freezing pavement and exhaling white clouds of warm air, they're waiting to do something that is as yet unknown in Australia: to walk in, sign on with a nickname or initials, receive a new needle and syringe and an alcohol swab, and await their turn to shoot up in peaceful and hygienic surroundings. [continues 1414 words]
Australia moved closer to its first safe drugs injecting room when John Howard backed down yesterday on his opposition to the scheme and the Uniting Church prepared to announce the site for its planned operation in Sydney's Kings Cross. The Prime Minister ruled out federal intervention to scuttle the planned heroin injecting rooms in NSW, Victoria and the ACT, saying he did not believe the commonwealth had the right to interfere in what was ultimately a decision for the states. [continues 367 words]
STANDOVER merchants in the country's largest women's jail forced weaker prisoners to vomit up their doses of prescribed methadone so they could feed their own addictions, a state parliamentary committee has been told.Prisoners were also forced to place tampons in their mouths to absorb the drug for others. The committee inquiring into the increase in the prison population in NSW was told drugs "come in truckloads" to Mulawa women's prison in western Sydney. Some warders were involved in the distribution of narcotics, the committee heard in evidence given in camera at the jail last week, and nearly half the weekend visits to the prison involved drug smuggling. [continues 356 words]
FOOTBALL legend Gary Ablett has told police he had no connection with the drugs that killed a 20-year-old woman who collapsed in his luxury hotel suite.A source close to the investigation said Ablett was "highly unlikely" to face charges over the death of Geelong woman Alisha Keely Horan. The source said the Homicide Squad had not been called in to examine the matter, indicating that police investigators did not believe the former AFL superstar played a role in the death. [continues 270 words]
AUSTRALIA'S first anti-craving treatment for alcoholics became available on the pharmaceutical benefits scheme from yesterday. Alcoholics will pay $20 for a month's supply of naltrexone but heroin addicts will continue to pay the wholesale price. Distributor Orphan Australia dropped the price of naitrexone on non-PBS private prescriptions from $160 to $144.50 last week but admits it will be almost impossible to secure a subsidy for heroin users. Naltrexone works by blocking opiod receptors in the brain, decreasing the reward sensation and diminishing the need for continued drug use. [continues 204 words]
THE article concerning the establishment of an injecting room in Kings Cross (1/2), stated that the Uniting Church has begun recruiting staff in defiance of a request by the UN Narcotics Control Board that "the project be stalled" until it has assessed its implications. At no time has the Uniting Church received any communication from the UN or its Narcotics Control Board. We are proceeding with the clinical trial of a medically supervised injecting centre under legislation passed last November by the NSW Parliament. Relationship with the UN is a matter for state and federal governments. [continues 59 words]
