'DUSTING' HAS A NEW MEANING

Huffing Method Made Possible By Keyboard Cleaner

Police, counselors and even office supply stores are becoming aware of a
new drug craze happening throughout the nation.

Dusting -- a form of huffing -- involves users inhaling compressed air
found in the most unassuming of household products: keyboard cleaner.

Maria Reiser, director of community outreach with Mount Pleasant Swift
Counseling, said dusting has gotten the group's attention, although it has
yet to deal with any specific case.

"Certain drugs go in and out in terms of trends," she said. "This is
extremely dangerous. There is a great risk of permanent brain damage or
death from first use."

Reiser said the compressed air in keyboard cleaners contains a refrigerant
which replaces the air in the lungs, giving users a brief buzz throughout
their body.

"They don't get high; it's a poison," she said. "They experience brain
damage right away."

Detective Lt. Amado Arceo, a supervisor for the Bay Area Narcotics
Enforcement Team, or BAYANET, said dusting could damage the heart, lungs,
kidneys and liver as well.

"When you take in chemicals like that, those types of things are going to
attack the central nervous system," he said. "It's really nothing to be
playing around with."

Like Reiser, Arceo hasn't come across this problem firsthand but he said
it's something that should be taken seriously.

"It's something that's out there," he said. "If people start thinking about
trying it, it's just as bad as other drugs. You can die from dusting just
as easily as you can die from meth(amphetamines) and crack."

Arceo said enforcement against dusting and other inhalant use is difficult
since the products being used are legal.

Many companies are beginning to institute store policies to try and limit
sales of items for such purposes.

Staples Corporation, a leading office supply chain, began prohibiting sales
of canned air to customers under 18 last fall, said company spokesman Owen
Davis.

"Staples instituted this policy to help enforce the warning label on the
can," Davis said. "Our cashiers are prompted and reminded to ask for
identification when a customer goes to buy a canned air product."

Arceo said similar policies in stores selling meth ingredients have limited
the spread of the drug. He doesn't know if this will be the case with the
new drug fad.

"I don't know if dusting will get to that point, but time will tell," Arceo
said.