BRITAIN'S COCAINE USE HITS NEW HIGH

More than 750,000 people take cocaine at least once a year as its
price falls and ecstasy loses its popularity among clubbers,
according to a wide-ranging study of drug abuse in Britain.

Official attempts to stem the use of illegal substances have failed,
with cocaine soaring in popularity and addiction to heroin remaining
stubbornly high.

The report delivers the bleak warning that Britain has the worst
levels of drug abuse in Europe and the continent's second highest
rate of drug-related deaths.

Cocaine use among young people has tripled since the late 1990s to
more than 750,000 in 2005-2006, the study for the new UK Drug Policy
Commission says.

Nearly 5 per cent of people entering drug rehabilitation programmes
say their main problem is with cocaine. The average street price has
dropped from UKP 69 ($187) to UKP 49 a gram over the past six years.

"From being an exclusive drug, used only by the wealthy and some
dependent drug users, it has now become part of the menu of
psychoactive substances that young people use to enhance their
leisure time. It may have come into fashion among these people as
ecstasy reduced in perceived quality," the report says.

It said one in four people aged 26 to 30 have tried a class A drug,
such as heroin, cocaine or ecstasy, at least once.

The number of heroin users has risen from 5000 in 1975 to an
estimated 281,000 in England and 50,000 in Scotland. It has now
stabilised at "levels that are very high by international standards".

With around 20 per cent of people arrested dependent on heroin, the
cost of drug-related crime in England and Wales is estimated at more
than UKP 13 billion.

Drug use is now of common experience for people born since 1970,
although most try cannabis only a few times with a small minority
going on to be problematic users of harder drugs.