ECSTASY 'EPIDEMIC' ALARMS AUTHORITIES

WASHINGTON - The name of the hottest party drug among teen-agers is 29
letters long: methylenedioxymethamphetamine, or MDMA.

Users know it by a sexier name: Ecstasy. They say it induces euphoria and
happiness and gives them the energy to dance and enjoy themselves during
all-night parties called raves. Many young people consider the club drug
harmless.

But drug researchers and lawmakers say Ecstasy is dangerous, pointing to
increasing scientific evidence showing the drug has long-term debilitating
effects on users' health, including death among those who overdose.

Alarmed by the exploding popularity of Ecstasy since the mid-1990s among
grade-school children, lawmakers have introduced bills in the House and the
Senate to educate people about Ecstasy, increase money for research and
steer federal grants to communities actively curbing the drug's spread.

The chief sponsors are Democratic Sen. Bob Graham and GOP Rep. John Mica,
both of Florida. More than a dozen other lawmakers are co-sponsoring the
bills. Congress didn't act on the bills before adjourning for the Christmas
break on Thursday.

The move marks the second time Congress has moved to crack down
specifically on Ecstasy, which has been in use for decades and was banned
by the federal government in 1985.

Last year, Congress directed the U.S. Sentencing Commission to increase
criminal penalties for users and traffickers of Ecstasy. But federal law
doesn't specify penalties for the use of Ecstasy.

"It's hard to turn your back on something that has such an epidemic
increase in use, particularly by our youths," Mica said. "It doesn't have
the stigma of heroin and cocaine, but it appears to have the same dangers."

Carol Reeves, director of the Greenville Family Partnership, said studies
are beginning to show there are long-term effects attached to Ecstasy use.
"We're setting up a whole future generation of problems that are going to
be psychiatric problems," she said.

Reeves said Ecstasy is the cocaine of this generation and that children
need to be educated about its dangers at a young age. She said enforcement
and education efforts are lagging behind because the drug has swept into
popular culture very quickly.

"There's not been anything ugly attached to it: no needles, no fights, no
shootings," she said. "It's just slipped in there as a very acceptable and
polite way to party."

Evidence of Ecstasy's rising popularity:

. The Drug Enforcement Administration seized 3 million Ecstasy tablets last
year, up from 1 million in 1999.

. DEA arrested 1,500 people in Ecstasy-related offenses in 2000, more than
double the previous year.

. U.S. Customs has seen a 430 percent jump in seizures of Ecstasy shipments
from overseas since 1997.

Twenty-seven states have anti-Ecstasy laws, most of which mandate prison
time and fines for abusing and trafficking, according to the National
Conference of State Legislatures.

Numerous local governments also have adopted ordinances allowing police to
arrest users and club owners who permit the sale of Ecstasy on their premises.

Some Greenville County Council members openly talked about putting new laws
on the books to help the Sheriff's Office battle the growth of raves, which
are all-night parties that attract Ecstasy users. Greenville County Sheriff
Sam Simmons, though, pointed out that deputies were able to make more than
50 arrests at two raves without new laws.

"I don't want to make it illegal to have a party," he said. "What I'm
trying to do is stop illegal drug use."

The drug is sold as a pill. Millions of Ecstasy pills are imported into the
United States, particularly from Western Europe.

Moderate use could lead to problems such as dehydration, overheating,
nausea, hallucination and blurred vision. Overdoses can cause fatal heart
failure and heat stroke, Joseph Keefe of the DEA told a Senate panel this
summer.

The drug reduces the supply of serotonin, a chemical in the brain that
regulates mood, emotion, learning, sleep and memory, and initial studies
show brain damage could be permanent, according to Donald Vereen of the
White House's Office of National Drug Control Policy.

Federal officials say no national numbers have been tallied on the number
of Ecstasy-related deaths.

Emergency-room admissions linked to the drug jumped from 250 in 1994 to
2,850 in 1999, according to the federal Drug Abuse Warning Network.

About 140 medical examiners have linked Ecstasy to nine deaths in 1998, the
last year for which numbers are available, three deaths in 1997, eight in
1996, six in 1995 and one in 1994, according to the warning network.

Some critics argue that more federal legislation won't reduce Ecstasy's
popularity. Authorities have been locking up people for Ecstasy-related
crimes for years, but the demand remains higher than ever, they note.

Educating people about the dangers of Ecstasy is the best way to curb
society's appetite for it, said Amu Ptah of the Harm Reduction Coalition, a
network of drug-law reformers.

Making users criminals won't do much good, she said.

"Let's move forward to edu-cate people in a nonjudgmental way, show them
ways to prevent the harm," Ptah said. "In this country, we go through
phases of drugs we want to demonize. It (was) crack in the '80s. It's
Ecstasy in the '90s."

Pharmacy professor Tony Tommasello of the University of Maryland-Baltimore
said youngsters are attracted to Ecstasy because it allows them to escape
the rigors of growing up in a complicated and sometimes harsh world.

Parents must become more involved in their children's lives and confront
them if they suspect their children are using drugs, however painful that
might be, said Tommasello, who researches substance abuse.

"Parents don't want to rock the boat. Rather than setting the limit, they
are giving tacit approval to very dangerous or destructive behaviors," he said.