DEATHS FROM HEROIN ON THE RISE IN WESTERN MASS. COMMUNITIES

SPRINGFIELD -- Three men under 25 have died of apparent heroin
overdoses in the last week and a half, and police think a batch of a
drug nicknamed "Me salve" -- Spanish for "I am saved" -- could be to
blame for at least some of the deaths.

Authorities said "Me salve" heroin killed 24-year-old Edward Thompson
of Chicopee and sent two of his friends to the hospital on July 22.

A day later, heroin from the same batch killed 24-year-old Christopher
Mercure of Hampden, police said.

And police are still trying to determine the source of the heroin that
killed 22-year-old Edguardo Torres of Holyoke, a father of three who
overdosed on July 20.

The deaths are evidence of the popularity, potency and availability of
the deadly drug in western Massachusetts.

"I think a lot of new users are trying it," Pamela Mersky-Hay, a
spokeswoman for the Drug Enforcement Administration's New England
field office, told the Union-News of Springfield. "It's like playing
with fire."

Heroin once was known as an inner-city drug that left telltale track
marks on the arms of users and helped HIV spread among addicts.

But the increasingly pure heroin distributed in New England over the
past few years can be snorted or smoked, and is seen as chic and
trendy by some younger people.

According to federal estimates, there are more than 800,000 regular
heroin users in the United States today, up from 500,000 three years
ago.

Some officials say the drug's growing presence in western
Massachusetts can be seen in Northampton's needle exchange program,
which tripled its number of needles distributed between 1997 and 1998,
with 12,721 in 1997 and 39,648 last year.

And numbers look steady for the coming year, said Timothy Purington,
who helps direct the program.

"We're incredibly busy," he said. "It's not just an urban problem
anymore. It's all over."

Police believe some are even coming to western Massachusetts from
other states to buy the drug.

Between May 1998 to April 1999, people from more that 40 different
communities have been arrested for drug offenses within Holyoke's city
limits, police said.

The alleged source of the "Me salve" heroin, Anibal Soler, 61, of
Holyoke, was arrested last week and charged with manslaughter.

But officials say the combination of inexpensive heroin and young
people willing to experiment with the drug may lead to more deaths.

"It used to be the middle-class people, the suburbanites, were afraid
of the stuff," said Lt. Kenneth Sullivan of the Hampden County Drug
Task Force. "Now they're more willing to experiment."