COCAINE NO LONGER THE DRUG OF CHOICE

Twenty-Five Years After 'Miami Vice' Became Part of the Country'S
Cocaine Culture Lore, Miami Is Leading the Nation in the Beginning Of
the End of America'S Three-Decade Cocaine Epidemic, Say Experts

In these rough economic times, another pricey extravagance appears to
be waning in South Florida: cocaine.

The city that gave rise to Sonny Crockett and Ricardo Tubbs has seen a
decline in people seeking treatment for cocaine addiction or dying
from the drug. Twenty five years after Miami Vice became part of the
country's cocaine culture lore, Miami is leading the nation in the
beginning of the end of America's three-decade cocaine epidemic, say
experts.

The war on drugs had its biggest influence on the purity of cocaine,
so drug users paid more and got less. And with a statewide
unemployment rate hovering at 10 percent, the scourge that destroyed
families and entire communities is being replaced with cheaper, easier
to acquire narcotics, according to the country's leading drug experts.

"It's not disappearing, but it's definitely declining," said James N.
Hall, Director of the Center for the Study and Prevention of Substance
Abuse at Nova Southeastern University. "People are getting half of
what they used to get -- and this is occurring in the middle of the
economic downturn. Cocaine, the most expensive drug on a per-dose
basis, is costing more." According to Hall's drug-abuse trends report:

The number of people rushed to local emergency rooms with cocaine
overdoses declined 14 percent from 2008 and 2009.

Last year, 549 people sought treatment for crack and powder cocaine
addictions, down from 918 the previous year. That's a startling 41
percent drop.

The number of cocaine overdoses in Miami-Dade County started
declining steadily in 2007, when 281 people suffered cocaine-related
deaths. Two years later, the number had dropped to 155. Last year's
number of cocaine deaths bumped back up to 198, but experts say that
increase was actually the result of more people mixing cocaine with
prescription drugs like Oxycodone.

With the $40 per gram price offering a lower purity product, drug
users wound up with fewer medical emergencies, Hall said.

"It's kind of ironic, given Miami's historic role in the cocaine
industry -- Miami Vice was part of the culture," said Paul Gootenberg,
a State University of New York professor who wrote Andean Cocaine: The
Making of a Global Drug. "The main thing to happen with cocaine in the
past 10 years is not a dramatic decline in supply, but a globalization
of cocaine: It's gone from Miami, Colombia and New York to Argentina,
Spain and Britain."

Gootenberg stressed that even if the rates of what experts call
"cocaine consequences" -- treatment admissions and overdoses -- are
down, "there's no conclusive evidence to claim any success in the drug
war."

The declines, Gootenberg said, are more likely a result of the market
and simple economics. "Florida is going through an enormous economic
crisis," he said. "People don't have money to spend on drugs."

But while cocaine may have fallen from fashion and favor, more
Floridians turned to prescription drugs. Of the 9,000 drug-related
deaths statewide last year, 6,090 showed the person used
benzodiazepines and Oxycodone. Prescription drug deaths increased 50
percent in Miami-Dade last year.

Cocaine ranked fifth behind booze and crystal meth in Florida's top
causes of drug deaths.

"There gets to be a point where users say, 'I can get my drugs from a
criminal doctor who prescribes me a pill, or I can get it from a
criminal with a Swedish machine gun on his back,'" said former
U.S. drug czar Barry McCaffrey, who served in the former Clinton
administration. "This is not necessarily good news. What needs to be
considered in South Florida is how many hardcore, stubborn,
drug-addicted, HIV-infected, unemployed substance abusers does it have?"

If cocaine rates are declining, McCaffrey said, it's because the
addicts who tore through inner city neighborhoods in the 1980s and 90s
are dead or in jail.

"Damn few people get away with the occasional use of cocaine," he
said. "All studies that track drug use show: if you are chronically
addicted to cocaine, you are not going to make it age 50."

Cocaine first became a controlled substance in 1970 when Americans
were more likely to use heroin. Cocaine became a sensation in the
1980s, when the powder form was the drug of choice among trendy
disco-hopping bankers and lawyers.

The smoked version dubbed "crack" swept U.S. inner cities in the
summer of 1986, followed by an explosion of violence. As the entry
point for Colombian cocaine, Miami emerged as the epicenter of the
industry and the first city to record an overdose, Hall said.

After a 15-year plateau, its use finally started to wane, especially
for crack.

"Miami was one of the first cities to show that decline," Hall said.
"What we noticed happening in Miami is now happening around the country."

He worries that it could regain its chic among today's youth, who have
started to use it again as a party drug at nightclubs, say experts.

Said McCaffrey: "If we forget about cocaine today, someone will rediscover it tomorrow."