CLUB DRUG USE ON THE RISE

LEXINGTON -- A local task force is alerting parents about the rapid
rise of club drug use among teen-agers.

Lexington police have confiscated 1,500 Ecstasy tablets this year,
compared with 10 in all of 1999. Overdoses of mind-altering club
drugs treated at the University of Kentucky Hospital emergency room
have more than tripled in the past year from 15 to 50.

"Club drugs" are several stimulants and sedatives popular at dance
clubs and all-night dance parties known as raves. GHB is also known
as the date rape drug. Ecstasy is a common nickname for the stimulant
3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine. It has structural similarities to
both amphetamine and mescaline, a hallucinogen.

Their growing popularity has prompted the Lexington Mayor's Alliance
on Substance Abuse to launch public information campaigns aimed at
communities and parents.

"It's not here in massive numbers," Lexington police Capt. John
Jacobs said. "But there's a core group of people who do party drugs.
It's a danger that needs to be recognized."

State police are also mobilizing against the problem. Lt. Kevin Payne
said public information officers will soon fan out into the state to
discuss club drugs with parents and community groups. The officers
took training two weeks ago, Payne said.

The state and local increase in use mirrors a national trend. The
number of federal convictions for Ecstasy trafficking has jumped
dramatically from 20 in 1998 to 169 last year, a 745 percent
increase, according to officials from the U.S. sentencing commission.

Federal guidelines enacted by the U.S. Sentencing Commission that
went into effect May 1 mean longer prison stays for people caught
with large quantities of Ecstasy pills. Someone caught with 800 pills
could serve five years, up from less than two years. And those caught
with 8,000 pills or more could serve 10 years.

Stephan Stapczynski, director of emergency medicine at UK Hospital,
said physicians have improved tests to determine whether people
coming into the emergency room have ingested GHB. He said most
patients are college age or in their 20s.

Club drugs can give users a boost of energy, relax them in social
situations, or deepen their sensory perceptions and provide
hallucinations.

The drugs can also sicken or kill partygoers by speeding their
heartbeats, exhausting and dehydrating them or conversely by relaxing
their bodies until motor skills, even breathing, become impossible.
They are especially dangerous if taken with alcohol, a depressant
that affects many of the same parts of the brain.

State officials aren't classifying drug overdoses by specific drugs,
said David Jones, executive director of the state Medical Examiner's
Branch. But Jones estimates that three club-drug deaths may have
occurred statewide in the last several months.