MORPHINE USE RIFE IN DARWIN: ADDICT

A former heroin addict and prostitute claims morphine drug abuse is in
"epidemic" proportions in Darwin.

And she slammed the NT Government for ignoring the problem. Cassie, not her
real name, said the Government simply ignored the reality of the worsening
morphine addiction in Darwin.

Cassie said she had been an "abstaining" IV drug addict for six years after
13 years of heavy heroin use.

And she readily admits keeping off drugs will always be a fight.

She said: "You never become an ex-junkie."

Cassie said she agreed with Chief Minister Denis Burke's claim Darwin
addicts were not big users of heroin. But she said the government did not
recognise morphine use was in "epidemic proportions."

She said: "Heroin use is minimal but IV use with morphine is absolutely
rampant."

Now a volunteer with youth drug workers, Cassie said NT kids were turning to
IV drugs and speed out of boredom, ignorance and alienation.

And work needed to be done to stop them taking drugs in the first place.
She said her life would have been different if she had had someone to talk
to when a teenager.

Alcohol and Other Drugs program director Ian Crundall told the _Sunday
Territorian_ last month figures showed NT addicts had the biggest morphine
habit in Australia. He said the black market in Darwin for prescription
drugs was thriving.

The NT Government has denied a growing intravenous (IV) drug problem and has
released figures suggesting it is small.

A spokesman for Mr Burke (a former health minister) said 1998 drug figures
were "barely measurable" with just 342 known NT IV drug users.

He said: "Alcohol is still the big problem. It will stay the focus in drug
use. IV drug use pales into significance when you look at alcohol abuse.

"Alcohol outweighs it in social cost."

But with regard to heroin and morphine use the spokesman admitted morphine
use "is the big one."

He said heroin was used by only 5.9% of our IV users.

The spokesman said between 1994-1998 the NT Coroner found the Territory had
12 deaths from drug overdoses out of the 500 coronial matters.

He said: "We don't have the drug problem of other states."