HEROIN DEATHS KEEP RISING

The Grim Toll Grows.

This year, heroin has been a factor in 11 deaths in Westmoreland County,
the county coroner's office reports.

The last occurred on Aug. 17, after a 30-year-old Jeannette man apparently
overdosed in Salem Township. He later died at Westmoreland Regional
Hospital in Greensburg.

In July, a 46-year-old Murrysville man died at his home with the drug in
his system.

And in June, heroin killed a 43-year-old Hempfield Township woman in
Greensburg.

Authorities also are investigating the case of a 59-year-old Derry Township
man who died on Aug. 29. County Coroner Ken Bacha won't rule on the cause
and manner of his death until toxicology results are complete. The test
results aren't expected for a few days, the coroner said.

Since May, the rise in heroin-related deaths in the county had appeared to
slow. Bacha said he hoped that word about the consequences of using heroin
was spreading faster than the drug.

"It did seem to slack off a little bit," he said. "Obviously, it's getting
a lot of publicity through the media. And police are out shaking the bushes."

The eight earlier heroin-related deaths involved seven men and one woman
who died between Feb. 24 and May 26. Their ages ranged from 19 to 43. Among
those is a 43-year-old man whose death originally was attributed to another
cause; now authorities blame heroin.

This year's drug toll is dramatically different from previous tallies. The
county recorded 16 drug deaths in 2001 - including one from heroin - and 45
fatal drug overdoses between 1992 and 2000, according to coroner's office
records.

So far this year, 18 people have died from confirmed drug overdoses in the
county.

Bacha said the 11 heroin deaths this year exceeded the total number
investigated by his father, Leo, during his 24 years as county coroner. The
younger Bacha succeeded his father as coroner in January.

Several factors are responsible for the rise in heroin use, authorities
say. Its price is down. The drug is available and highly addictive. It is
more concentrated than it used to be and can be inhaled, or snorted - at
least at first.

Health and addiction specialists call the ability to snort the drug a
"silent introduction," since users typically go from inhaling heroin to
injecting it to get high faster. A smaller percentage of users smoke the drug.

Heroin's image also has undergone a change. When he was younger, Bacha
said, heroin was viewed as the drug of choice among hard-core, inner- city
addicts.

"It's no longer that. You see a whole different class (using it). It's
opened my eyes," he said.

Dr. Robert Woolhandler, a Pittsburgh drug addiction specialist, said most
heroin-caused deaths are accidental. Many result from breathing suppression.

Woolhandler, who serves as a consultant for the Fayette County Drug and
Alcohol Commission, said three factors typically are responsible for a
heroin death: a drug stronger or more concentrated than the user is
accustomed to; the user's body position after drug use; or a user "pushing
the envelope to get a little higher."

Besides the risk of death, long-term medical consequences from using heroin
include collapsed veins, infection of the heart lining and valves,
abscesses and liver disease. Pulmonary complications, including various
types of pneumonia, may result from the poor health of the user, as well as
from heroin's depressing effects on respiration, medical experts said.

Street heroin may contain additives that do not dissolve readily and may
clog the blood vessels that lead to the lungs, liver, kidneys or brain,
they warn.

Heroin is derived from morphine. It is a "downer" that affects the brain's
pleasure system and interferes with the brain's ability to perceive pain.
Health officials estimate that between 600,000 and 1 million Americans are
heroin addicts.

About 1.2 percent of Americans reported trying heroin at least once,
according to the 2000 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse. The U.S.
Drug Enforcement Agency says that in 1999, there were nearly 105,000 new
heroin users.

Patti Young, a therapist with the Drug and Alcohol Services program
operated by Westmoreland Regional Hospital, said in July that she has been
seeing more and more clients with heroin in their pasts.

"I would say in the past few years there's been a jump. And there are
probably many people out there that aren't in treatment, either," she said.

Young, a therapist for both adults and adolescents for 13 years, said most
heroin addicts used other drugs first.

"A lot of times you'll find that people are cross-addicted to many
different chemicals," she said. "Generally speaking, when you take their
histories, they will tell you they started using marijuana, they started
out using alcohol, then it might progress to other types of use.

"I mean, it's rare that I see somebody who says, 'Oh, I tried heroin for
the first time without using any of the other gateway kinds of drugs.'"

She attributed the progression to the way addicts view their situation.

"What happens with addicts is that they use to feel euphoric, so they go
from being in a state of normal to being euphoric. And so, after they've
developed a tolerance, the solution may be to let me use another chemical
to help me get higher," Young said.

Bacha said there has been some "overlapping" among the heroin deaths in the
county, including victims who knew one another. This information has been
shared with police, he said.

The confirmed heroin deaths have been spread out in the county, although
three stemmed from incidents in Derry Township and two others occurred in
Hempfield Township.