Series: Part 3 Of 3: The Enemy Within

THE EUROPEAN MARKET

The Heroin Route From Afghanistan To Europe - Pt. 3

The social impact of heroin usage is massive, creating outcasts and
criminals (23% of France's prison population has injected heroin at least
once), infectious diseases (20% of users are HIV positive in France),
overdoses and intoxication (7-8,000 deaths every year in Europe). Yet this
is out of proportion to the relatively low number of users. In its 2001
report, the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction
(EMCDDA) estimates the proportion of problem drug users (1) in the European
Union at five to eight per 1,000 inhabitants (aged 15-64) in the United
Kingdom, Italy and Portugal, three to five in France, Spain and Ireland,
and two to three in Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium.

For heroin addicts, mortality is 20-30 times higher than average. Heroin
cut with toxic substances killed 43 people in the UK and Ireland in a few
months in 2000-01. The damage done by heroin has received much media
attention, to good effect. Consumption has stabilised or is declining in
European countries, apart from Ireland and Finland. In the Helsinki area it
has increased by 40% in two years.

"Did humans discover fire or drugs first?" asked a recent TV ad funded by
the French authorities. It showed cave dwellers smoking psychotropes. Given
the social acceptance of drugs, there are limits to what repression can
achieve. The EMCDDA report notes that "countries with more liberal drug
policies (such as the Netherlands) and those with a more restrictive
approach (such as Sweden) do not have very different prevalence rates".

But substitution treatments, using methadone for instance, seem to be
effective, yielding "crime reduction, health improvement and social
integration". The UK, Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland and Germany are
experimenting with heroin prescription under medical supervision. In
January 1997, following five fatal overdoses in one day in Bremen, the
police chiefs of 10 German cities appealed to the federal government to
authorise this approach, hoping to reintegrate addicts, supervise the
composition of injected substances and beat organised crime by depriving it
of its market.
(1) "Problem drug use is defined as injecting drug use or long-
duration/regular use of opiates, cocaine and/or amphetamines. This
definition excludes ecstasy and cannabis users," EMCDDA report, 2001.