SUBURBS LEAD SURGE IN HEROIN USE

The Chicago metropolitan area ranks second only to Philadelphia in
heroin-related deaths, with young suburbanites accounting for a big
increase in use of the illegal drug here, a new study shows.

Heroin overdoses in the Chicago region claimed 352 lives in 2001 -- a 57
percent increase from 1996, according to researchers from Roosevelt
University's Institute for Metropolitan Affairs.

The study's authors, who will formally release their findings today,
reviewed national records of drug overdoses, hospital admissions and
discharges, as well as admissions to drug-treatment programs, to sketch a
disturbing picture of the widespread harm caused by heroin. While including
national statistics, the study's prime focus was heroin use in Cook and the
five collar counties.