DRUGS KILLING FORMER YOUTH PRISONERS

Boys and young men released from Victorian juvenile justice centres are
dying at rates 10 times that of the general community, a study has found.

Young women released from custody had 40 times the death rate of similarly
aged women in the community, although the number of deaths was low compared
with males.

The study's author, Dr Friederike Veit, of the Adolescent Forensic Health
Service, described the mortality rates as alarming, and welfare groups
yesterday called on the State Government to increase resources for young
offenders coming out of custody.

More than one-third of the deaths occurred within three months of release
from the Melbourne Juvenile Justice Centre, the Parkville Youth Residential
Centre or Malmsbury Juvenile Justice Centre.

Almost 100 young people - mainly males - who had served time in juvenile
justice centres or adult prisons had died between 1988 and 1999.

Of the 88 deaths of young men, 40 were from drug-related causes, mainly
overdoses.

Four of the eight deaths of women four were drug-related.

Dr Veit said the high drug-related death rates soon after release were due
mainly to offenders' tolerance to heroin dropping while in custody, placing
them at greater risk of overdose.

Dr Veit will release her findings at the Royal Australasian College of
Physicians annual conference in Sydney today.

A separate study of 820 unnatural deaths of men and women released from
adult prisons between 1990 and last year shows disturbingly similar trends.

It found that the death rate of former prisoners was 10 times that of the
community, and 30 times greater in the first year of release. The risk of
dying soon after release was higher for women prisoners. Sixty per cent of
the 820 deaths involved drugs, and 51 per cent were heroin-related. At
least 25 per cent of all Victorian heroin-related deaths involved former
prisoners.

"If these unnatural deaths are to be prevented, drug-harm and other harm
minimisation programs need to be available to prisoners during the period
of their incarceration and following their release," the report said.

In March, coroner Jacinta Heffey called for a review of services available
to prisoners after examining the death of a young, drug-addicted man
released from the Fulham Correctional Centre near Sale. Andrew Charles (his
surname has been withheld at the family's request) was driven to the Sale
railway station by a prison officer and left to fend for himself. He died
the next day from a heroin overdose.

Ms Heffey said: "This case is but one example of the need for the
correctional system to provide comprehensive pre-release and post-release
programs in all prisons, for all short and long-term prisoners."

Dr Veit said: "Young people are not dying in custody, where we can reach
them to provide care and support. They are dying back in the community."

The three main welfare agencies providing advocacy for youths let out of
juvenile justice centres say they do not have resources to meet demand.