Pubdate: Sun, 26 Aug 2007
Source: Edmonton Journal (CN AB)
Copyright: 2007 The Edmonton Journal
Contact:  http://www.canada.com/edmonton/edmontonjournal/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/134
Author: Amanda Ferguson
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/coke.htm (Cocaine)

COCAINE EASIER TO BUY THAN PIZZA

Drugs, Alcohol Plague Transient Workers Living On Fringes Of Oilpatch 
Boom Towns

Even when living in the remote work camps of northern Alberta, Ken 
was never far from his next fix.

If cocaine wasn't being used inside his camp of 3,000 oil workers in 
the outskirts of Fort McMurray, it lingered just outside in the 
pockets of the drug dealers who prowled outside the gates like predators.

"I could get it quicker than I could get a pizza," says Ken, not his real name.

What began as a flirtation with alcohol and cocaine when he first 
moved out to the Fort McMurray area at age 17 slowly grew into a 
full-blown addiction. By his late 20s, the young welder was engaging 
in whirlwind cocaine binges that lasted days.

As with many of his fellow workers, the mix of isolation, boredom and 
high wages created the right conditions for the perfect storm of 
substance abuse.

"You're away from your kids, you're away from everything. It's just 
10 times harder to cope," he says.

"It wasn't the camps that were the problem, it's the accessibility. 
You made your choice of what you do with it."

As Alberta's petroleum industry moves through a period of 
unprecedented growth, northern communities are finding themselves 
increasingly swamped by cases of alcoholism and drug abuse.

Some experts suggest the problem has reached epidemic proportions, 
forcing police detachments, social services and oil companies to come 
up with new approaches.

"It is happening so rapidly that for municipalities and for the 
provincial government, the challenge has been keeping up with it," 
says Dan Dibbelt of the Northern Alberta Development Council.

Alberta's per capita average consumption of alcoholic beverages is 
nine litres a year -- or about 524 bottles of beer a year for each 
Albertan 15 or older.

The national average is 7.9 litres, according to a Canadian addiction 
survey from 2004.

Commissioned in part by Health Canada, the survey, which questioned 
more than 2,400 Albertans, was the third national survey in less than 
five years to examine drug and alcohol use across Canada.

The survey found that, from 1994 to 2004, the province's consumption 
average increased by 1.5 litres.

Drug use isn't far behind, with marijuana, crack cocaine and crystal 
meth problems being reported in many oil communities.

And wherever substance abuse has soared, crime has inevitably followed.

An unreleased development council study found that crime levels in 
communities such as Grande Prairie, Slave Lake, Cold Lake and Fort 
McMurray are now much higher than the provincial norm. Fort McMurray, 
for example, has an overall crime rate five times the provincial average.

Some experts, such as the Alberta Alcohol and Drug Abuse Commission's 
Barry Andres, chalk up the problem to a "wild west frontier 
mentality" that sees people embrace a work hard, play harder outlook.

But other insiders say Alberta's skyrocketing substance abuse points 
to a growing disconnect between a city's transient workers and the 
local community.

In some hydrocarbon towns, transients working in the oil and gas 
sector more than double the permanent population.

"These people are not committed to their community," says Dibbelt. 
"You don't see these people involved in things like soccer, you don't 
see those people sitting on committees or councils, or things like that."

John Parkins, co-author of Beyond Boredom: Contributing Factors to 
Substance Abuse in Hinton, says the increasing prevalence of drug and 
alcohol abuse is connected to an increasing sense of isolation coming 
from the community's oil workers.

Hinton has a mobile population ranging between 5,000 and 9,000 
people, almost double the size of its permanent residents.

"The people we talked to were definitely aware that this has been 
part of their community for a long time," he said.

"For many communities like Hinton, the boom has simply exacerbated 
the conditions that are already prevalent within these communities."

On the front lines of this ongoing battle are substance abuse 
treatment centres.

Andres says AADAC is treating twice as many patients as it did 10 
years earlier. The Fort McMurray office has seen a 25-per-cent 
increase in the number of clients since January 2006.

With social services increasingly swamped, the Alberta government, 
police and oil companies have had to take a bigger role in the fight 
against addiction.

This June, AADAC teamed with the RCMP and several petroleum companies 
to create the Drug and Alcohol Council for Safe Workplaces. The 
council monitors the safety hazards of having intoxicated employees 
in the workplace with a focus on finding help for those with addictions.

"The companies are being very proactive," says Barb Robbins, manager 
of AADAC's Grande Prairie office.

"We've been consulted by a number of them asking to review their 
alcohol and drug policy, or they will consult with us with the other 
things they should be putting in place."

Most of the biggest companies now conduct drug tests before hiring, 
as well as after any workplace accident.

If they fear an employee has an addiction, many require the worker to 
go a treatment facility for assessment.

But some experts say the problems are now evolving past the current solutions.

"We're now seeing less assessments being requested by employers 
because given the job opportunities that people have, they can quit 
one job and not necessarily have to follow through on those employer 
recommendations," Robbins said.

For Edmonton resident Dianne Vawter, who saw two of her own family 
members go through drug addictions, the feelings of isolation can 
spread far beyond the camps of Fort McMurray.

"When they were going through it, for me, it was confusion, 
depression, fear," Vawter says. "I didn't know what was going on ... 
it was every family's worst nightmare."

Vawter convinced her family members to get help after months of 
research and grappling with her own depression.

As a result of her own experience, Vawter created Crave Life-Drug 
Free, a drug rehab placement and intervention agency for families 
desperate to find help for loved ones.

"I am just a mother trying to help other families who are trying to 
paddle their way through this maze and get help for their kids," she says.

"A lot of people don't realize that there is hope and there is help out there."

Her program is now spreading into places like Fort McMurray, where 
Vawter believes help is needed most.

For Ken, the camps are now a distant memory.

Drug-free for more than two years, he is back on the job working as a 
contractor in Fort Saskatchewan.

He says he got clean after going through an innovative treatment 
program that addresses the biophysical and biochemical imbalances 
from addiction through a unique sauna program.

"I didn't quite lose everything, but I almost did."

He believes more unconventional programs like this are required if 
the oil companies are going to get a handle on the troubling trend.

"No matter what you do to try and seclude drugs from being in a camp, 
or anywhere in any town ... there are people that will get it in," Ken says.

"There's too many people doing it, too many people selling it."

THE TOLL IT TAKES

- - Alberta's alcohol consumption rates are much higher than the rest 
of Canada, says Barry Andres, AADAC's vice-president of community 
services. Alberta's per capita average of alcohol consumption is nine 
litres a year -- or about 524 bottles of beer a year for each 
Albertan 15 or older -- compared with the national average of 7.9 litres.

"Alcohol is the single greatest drug of concern in Alberta," Andres 
says. "It is the untold story and as a society it's something we 
don't want to recognize."

- - Alcohol abuse costs the province $1.6 billion a year in lost 
productivity, direct health-care costs and law enforcement, according 
to AADAC estimates.

- - Drug addicts commit 92 per cent of armed robberies and 74 per cent 
of property crimes in Alberta, according to Edmonton's Clean Scene, a 
drug awareness agency.

- - Marijuana is the most used drug by Canadians, according to the 
Canadian Addiction survey -- 63.4 per cent of all Canadians have used 
the drug in their lifetime. Next is hallucinogens at 11.4 per cent, 
followed by cocaine (10.6 per cent), speed (6.4 per cent) and ecstacy 
(4.1 per cent).

- - For more information on Crave Life Drug Free, call 780-936-6074 or 
780-637-4702 or visit www.CraveLife-DrugFree.com.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom