STUDY INTO MYSTERIOUS ASPECT OF HEROIN DEATHS

A study into the reason for fatal heroin overdoses will rely on forensic
analysis of hair samples taken from drug users - living and dead.

The research, to mirror similar work recently completed in Italy, will
attempt to explain a problem that has puzzled health authorities worldwide
for several years: why do so many overdose deaths show drug concentrations
well below those of living heroin users?

The number of fatal overdoses in NSW increased from 152 in 1992 to 226 in
1996, with the most "typical" heroin-related death involving a male around
the age of 30 who is drug dependent.

The research will look at morphine concentrations in the hair samples of
fatal overdose cases, current heroin users and allegedly abstinent former
users.

Heroin is rapidly metabolised into morphine once administered and can be
detected in hair samples up to six months after intake. Higher levels of
morphine concentrations in the hair mean higher levels of use. However in
the Italian study, morphine concentrations in the fatal cases were
significantly lower than those of current users and not significantly
different from the group of abstainers. The Italian authors argued that
most fatalities had started to re-use heroin after a period of abstinence,
with a resultant loss of tolerance.

However the Italian study did not correlate this data with personal
histories of the fatal cases or the control subjects.

In Australia, information to be collected will include personal histories
and blood and bile toxicology from coronial files.

The Minister for Health, Mr Knowles, said the Department of Health would
now channel $8,000 into the project in a bid to provide new information
that may help prevent more deaths.

According to Dr Shane Darke of the National Drug and Alcohol Research
Centre (NDARC), overdose is the largest single cause of death among
Australian heroin users. Most research had focused on infectious diseases.