HOSPITALS ALARMED BY WAVE OF TEEN ECSTASY VICTIMS

Physicians, Police Warn Of Dangers Of Locally Produced Designer Drug

Lower Mainland hospital emergency centres are seeing a big increase in
the number of young people suffering acute reactions to rave drugs, as
well as comatose teens brought in the day after using them.

Dr. Sal Denny, a pediatrician who consults at B.C. Children's Hospital
and is with the addiction medicine service at Royal Columbian
Hospital, says rave drugs - mainly ecstasy and crystal meth - are very
dangerous because some kids have "quirky" acute reactions.

Dr. Denny says there's been a "definite increase" of ravers in ERs
over the last two years, most aged 15 or 16 and some as young as 12.

"The last death was a 22-year-old through Royal Columbian a couple of
months ago," she said.

The designer drug ecstasy is sweeping through B.C. and has become the
recreational drug of choice among young people.

"It's huge," says Cpl. Scott Rintoul of RCMP's drug awareness
squad.

"The only reason we don't have users dying in B.C. is much of the
stuff in the capsules is not pure."

Bad reactions include extremely high blood pressure, high temperature
and seizures.

Says Dr. Denny: "Ecstasy is a terribly unpredictable and dangerous drug.
More than half of those I see are first-time users and I see them in very
dangerous shape."

Many of the teens are good students, she said, who are getting their
first taste of freedom and have just started experimenting with drugs.

Most of the cases are happening at Royal Columbian or outlying
hospitals, said Denny, because raves typically take place in outlying
warehouses or barns.

She said some youth are being brought into emergency the day after the
rave by parents or others who can't wake them up.

"They need ventilator support. Maybe they've been drinking too much
water and they have kidney failure."

The longer-term problems are depression, said Denny. "Ecstasy
overdrives the feel-good centre of the brain and then in withdrawal,
the brain cannot replace those chemicals.

"So we're getting kids who were good students, some straight As, who
are not sleeping, are down in the dumps, not going to school and not
getting along with their parents.

"Down the road there may be significant bio-chemical depression. We
don't know if it is permanent because we don't know enough about the
drug."

Police say the producers behind this wave of problems are
organized-crime groups, who are running at least 15 chemical
laboratories in B.C.

The labs, which police suspect are mostly in the Greater Vancouver
area, are making ecstasy capsules and selling them for between $20 and
$25 a hit, mainly to teenagers attending raves.

Rintoul of the RCMP said many of the labs are mixing in other, cheaper
chemicals, even caffeine, and selling them as ecstasy. He said police
have already taken down 15 underground labs this year and it will only
be a matter of time before the others are dismantled.

Once associated with raves, the drug has hit university campuses, high
schools, bars and chemical users in the gay community.

Investigators say outlaw motorcycle gangs, Asian gangs and the Russian
and Eastern European mafia all have a hand in the manufacture and
distribution of the lucrative designer drugs.

In addition to the recent death at Royal Columbian, there have been
three ecstasy-related deaths in B.C. in recent years.

Ontario has had nine deaths this year alone. Rintoul said the
relatively low number of ecstasy deaths here is only due to the low
quality of the drugs on the street.

"If our kids weren't getting ripped off by dealers, getting partial
mixes and low concentrations of ecstasy, we'd have the same problem
with overdoses," he said.

"Of the drugs we've seized being sold as ecstasy, only 30 per cent are
actually 'e.' The rest are different mixes of 60 per cent stimulants
and 40 per cent hallucinogens.

"Poly" drug use - simultaneous use of a number of drugs - is another
emerging trend that is worrying," said Rintoul.

The same trend is making it difficult for emergency room staff to
identify exactly what kind of overdose is coming through the door.

"When people go to raves, they are ingesting different drugs," said
Dr. Kirk Hollohan of St. Paul's Hospital's emergency room in Vancouver.

"It's really a situation where we are never completely sure what we're
dealing with."