HEROIN BIG KILLER IN SAN FRANCISCO

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) Heroin's popularity is growing among San Francisco's
homeless and it's killing them.

Of 86 drug-related deaths among the homeless last year, 40 were connected
to heroin, according to a health department study released Tuesday.

"Cocaine is a drug of celebration and heroin is a drug of desperation,"
said Evelyn James, spokesman for the federal Drug Enforcement
Administration in San Francisco. "When people are on the street and they
want to feel out of it ... heroin will do that for them."

One-hundred-fifty-seven homeless people died in San Francisco between Dec.
1, 1997 and Nov. 30, 1998 the highest number since the city started keeping
track in 1987.

"The majority of people you see on the street have a substance abuse
problem. That problem is what caused them to be homeless," said Earl
Rynerson, a former member of San Francisco's Human Services Commission,
which decides how to allocate public money.

Increasingly pure heroin is readily available on the streets and can be had
at a relatively low cost. A single dose, about a quarter gram, costs about
$20.

Critics say much of the $287 monthly assistance payments many homeless
receive doesn't go toward food or housing.

"The first and 15th are like pay days," Puccinelli said. "They get it and
they don't use the money for living expenses ... the money goes into
narcotics and alcohol."

The 157 deaths far exceeded both the 104 recorded the previous year and the
average of 118 deaths each year on city streets since 1987.

Authorities estimate as many as 14,000 people live on San Francisco's
streets.

Checked-by: Mike Gogulski