CHEAP, POTENT HEROIN LEADS TO RECORD USAGE IN THE NORTHWEST

ATLANTA, July 21 -- Heroin use has risen dramatically in the
Pacific Northwest, with overdoses in the Portland, Ore. area,
accounting for nearly as many deaths among young and middle-aged men as
cancer or heart disease, the government said today.

The drug, at about $20 a dose, is cheap on the West Coast, and black
tar heroin from Mexico or South America is readily available there, the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.

Other studies have indicated heroin overdoses increasing in most U.S.
cities in the 1990s, but not as dramatically as in Seattle and
Portland.

Multnomah County, Ore., which includes Portland, analyzed medical
examiner reports and found that heroin overdose deaths climbed
steadily from 46 in 1993 to 111 in 1999, a 141 percent increase.
Eighty-seven percent of the overdoses were among men.

Drug Deaths Way Up In 1997, 67 men ages 25 to 54 died from heroin
overdoses in the county, compared with 88 from cancer, 73 from heart
disease and 44 from AIDS. But statistics from the Drug Abuse Warning
Network indicate that use of the drug is increasing in most large
cities.

During 1994 to 1998, DAWN received reports of 20,140 drug-induced
deaths in the United States where heroin or related opiates were
detected. During that four-year span, heroin overdose deaths increased
25.7 percent.

The CDC said its report probably underestimated heroin overdoses. Many
deaths were excluded because they may have been suicides, and 52 were
excluded because the victims were not residents of Multnomah County.

The Seattle area saw a similar increase, as the number of heroin
overdose deaths climbed from 47 in 1990 to 110 in 1999, a 134 percent
rise. The population of King County increased 11.3 percent during the
same period.

Deaths from overdoses of heroin and other opiates peaked in 1998 with
140 deaths.

Injection increases the risk of death because of the rapid rise of
opiate levels in the blood, the CDC said. Black tar heroin is usually
injected because it is too impure to snort. In most opiate overdose
deaths, alcohol and other drugs were also involved, the CDC reported.

Price, Availability and Glamour Dr. Gary Oxman, director of the
Multnomah County health department, said price, availability and a
glamorization of the drug in movies and music have contributed to the
rapid growth.

"In today's economy you can work a minimum-wage job and scrape up
enough for housing and food and be a heroin addict. It used to be a
lot more expensive," he said. "We've also seen that heroin at various
times has been seen as a fashionable drug."

Oxman said heroin users develop a tolerance to higher doses and most
users eventually stop injecting for periods of time, usually when they
are jailed, run out of money or seek rehabilitation. When they resume,
they often inject the same dose, and since the body's tolerance has
declined, they often overdose.

Users Hesitate to Call to Help Three fourths of the users in Seattle
interviewed said they hesitate to call for emergency assistance for
fear of being arrested.

"We need enhanced prevention and treatment for opiate addiction and
we're going to need a better balance of resources," said Dr. Alonzo
Plough, director of the Seattle-area public health office.

He said federal dollars should be diverted from drug-trafficking
programs and placed into treatment, which has proved to be more
successful.

"These death rates can be brought down with aggressive prevention and
more treatment capacity," he said.