BRITISH TEENAGERS USE SO MUCH CANNABIS THAT MARKET IS SATURATED, SAYS EU REPORT

Cannabis use among teenagers in the UK has begun to stabilise, but only
because it is so widespread the market has become saturated, the European
Union's drug agency warned yesterday. The EU monitoring centre on drugs and
drug abuse also warned of new public health dangers from the increasing
potency of cannabis available in Britain. It raised concerns about the
long-term health implications of the emergence of a significant new group
of teenage boys who are using cannabis intensively - more than 20 times a
month.

Its annual report, published yesterday, says the official goal of reducing
drug consumption by 2006 across Europe remains a long way off, with at
least one in five adults in the EU having tried cannabis and an emerging
problem of growing cocaine use in some cities, particularly in Britain.

The agency warns that the drug-related death toll continues to rise - there
are between 7,000 and 9,000 deaths every year in the EU.

It says that glue-sniffing and other forms of solvent abuse have proved a
much greater acute health risk for young people in the UK than ecstasy,
which causes fewer but more highly publicised deaths.

It says that there were 1,700 deaths from solvent abuse in the UK between
1983 and 2000, with most of the victims aged 16 to 19 - far more than the
"relatively rare" ecstasy deaths.

The authors say that recent government measures have been effective in
sharply reducing solvent-abuse deaths in Britain over the last four years.

Solvents remain the third most commonly used drug after cannabis and
alcohol, with 15% of 15 and 16-year-olds trying them at some time.

The EU says that ecstasy use was high in 1995 in the UK, Italy and Ireland
but has recently seen some decline. It suggests that the high-profile
negative media coverage has been a factor.

The report also confirms the more liberal approach of many governments to
drug policy, with harm-reduction measures such as needle exchanges, drug
consumption rooms, methadone treatment, heroin prescribing and pill testing
becoming an established part of health policy in Holland, Germany and Spain.

However, it shows that the UK is lagging behind other European countries in
providing treatment places for hardcore drug abusers.

But while Switzerland is about to become the first country to legalise
cannabis possession, the eastern European states which are to join the EU
next May have been busy outlawing it for the first time.

Georges Estievenart, director of the agency, said there were some grounds
for cautious optimism about the drug situation in Europe, such as the
adoption of a drug strategy by most national governments.

But he added that this was outweighed by the fact that the overall drug use
trend re mained upward and there was "insufficient impact on regular drug
use by a worrying number of young people in EU countries".

The report says that cannabis remains the illicit drug most frequently used
by young people across Europe. The UK has one of the highest usage levels
in Europe, with 42% of all 15 to 34-year-olds saying they had tried it at
least once - second only to Denmark.

The price of cannabis resin has been stable across the rest of Europe but
has fallen sharply in the past four years in Britain, possibly as a result
of the rapid rise in homegrown marijuana production, which has been
estimated at 50% of the market. Hashish, which is nearly all imported from
Morocco, is cheapest in Britain at €2.3 (UKP1.60) a gram, and most
expensive in Norway at €26.6.

"Europe remains the world's biggest market for cannabis resin (hashish),
accounting for some three-quarters of global seizures. Herbal cannabis or
marijuana grown in the EU is also becoming increasingly available.

"Evidence indicates that the average potency of cannabis in the EU has
risen and now ranges from around 5-10% for both resin and herbal varieties,
but some samples are considerably stronger with a THC [the active
ingredient] content of up to 30%. This raises public health concerns."

A decade ago the THC content of most cannabis was about 1% to 2%.

But the EU's drugs agency is also worried about the emergence of a new
generation of teenage boys who are starting to use cannabis at a younger
age, instead of sniffing glue. They are using it more intensively - more
than 20 times a month - and persist with it perhaps until their early 20s.
It says this pattern of use is often mixed with binge drinking.

The report for the first time looks at the drug situation in eastern Europe
and warns that some countries, including Estonia and Latvia, will be facing
"the most rapidly developing HIV epidemic in the world" unless syringe and
needle exchange programmes are adopted to tackle the problem.