HEROIN USERS STARTING YOUNGER AT $25 A HIT

Australia is awash with heroin. More people are addicted to the drug,
first-time users are starting younger, and prices are hitting an all-time
low of $25 a shot in some parts of Sydney, a national report has found.

Parents have been warned that teenagers are graduating to syringes earlier
than ever before. The age of initiation among younger users has dropped two
years to 17, and 76 per cent of users under 25 report that heroin was the
first drug they had injected.

The Illicit Drug Reporting System, prepared for the Commonwealth Department
of Health, is scheduled for release at a conference today. It provides a
national snapshot of the four main drug markets - heroin, amphetamines,
cannabis and cocaine.

The University of NSW's Dr Shane Darke, a senior investigator on the
project, warned yesterday that parents should look out for binge drinking
among early teenagers as an indication of potential heroin use.

``Heroin use doesn't just happen overnight. But typically, a pattern of
early drinking, of heavy drinking starting at the age of 12, of getting
drunk at 13, should be of very serious concern,'' he told the Herald.

``We constantly get cannabis cited as the gateway drug [to heroin]. Alcohol
is the first they walk through and parents should treat alcohol abuse just
as seriously.''

Dr Darke said the report also reveals an alarming change in use patterns
among young people.

``Younger ones are going straight into heroin, something that has very
serious implications. In the past, it was a consistent pattern that
injecting began with amphetamines.

``Part of that is clearly that as the quality of amphetamine remains poor,
the price of heroin has decreased substantially while purity has risen.''

The report, which for the first time this year covers all States and
territories, found that in 1997 the price of heroin in NSW was $400 a gram.
This year it has dropped to as low as $240 in NSW and $200 in western
Sydney. In Victoria the price was $300.

Smaller amounts of heroin, known as ``caps'', which usually contain not
much more than one shot, were available in NSW and Victoria for $20 to $30.

Heroin purity, the study says, has continued to increase throughout the
country over the last few years, stabilising at the high levels previously
found only in NSW. The average purity of heroin seizures in Australia is
now around 60 to 70 per cent, compared to between 5 and 10 per cent 10
years ago.

Cocaine use, on the other hand, continued to be uncommon in all States and
territories except NSW, where it peaked in late 1998.

Prices remained stable with national figures at around $200 to $250 a gram.
The purity of cocaine had risen slightly since 1998, with an average of
about 50 per cent.