Pubdate: Wed, 07 Mar 2001
Source: Age, The (Australia)
Copyright: 2001 The Age Company Ltd
Contact:  250 Spencer Street, Melbourne, 3000, Australia
Website: http://www.theage.com.au/
Author: Larissa Dubecki

BIG RISE IN OVERDOSE DEATHS

Heroin-related deaths in Victoria have increased dramatically over 
the past decade, but figures for this year suggest a temporary 
downturn.

Heroin claimed 331 Victorians last year, down 8per cent from a peak 
of 359 deaths in 1999, but still far more than the 49 deaths recorded 
in 1991.

Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine figures show a huge increase 
in heroin-related deaths in the past 36 months. There were 166 
overdose deaths in 1997, rising to 268 in 1998.

This year, there were six heroin-related deaths in January and two in 
February compared with last year when an average of 28 heroin users 
died each month in Victoria.

Turning Point drug and alcohol centre's senior research fellow, Paul 
Dietze, said indications were that there had been a drop in supply 
this year.

"I understand there's been a few more deaths and there have been 
reports of more non-fatal overdoses. There's just been an 
interruption of supply, and those sort of things fluctuate over 
time," he said.

Since 1991, 1731 people, 80 per cent of them men, have died after using heroin.
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