Fernando Henrique Cardoso is not alone in recommending that the war on drugs should end. What he fails to realise is that the insatiable demand for drugs by cashed-up Western nations looking to alter their collective state of consciousness is so great that to acknowledge its extent is political poison. Add to this the burgeoning industries that have sprung up to counter the criminalisation of drugs. These would cease to make a nice living were illicit drugs off the banned list. Dr Raymond Seidler Kings Cross [end]
As heroin dries up on the streets of Sydney new problems arise ("Drop in heroin use but crime levels stay same", Herald, October 18). What little heroin around is now significantly cut with contaminants and has risen in price from $280 a gram to $400. This means users have to find more money for their habits and risk infection. There has been an alarming increase in cocaine and amphetamines including shabu or "ice" a particularly potent form of crystal methamphetamine on the streets. Users are agitated aggressive and sometimes psychotic when using large amounts of these readily available stimulants. Drug users will often replace one illicit drug for another, sometimes with catastrophic consequences. We must be careful about claiming a victory in an unwinnable war. Dr Raymond Seidler, Kings Cross, October 18. [end]
Signs that many young gays in America are no longer heeding the safe sex message are ominous ("Rate of infection on rise among young US gays" Herald, July 12). Add to this the rising failure rate of the anti-retroviral treatments hitherto widely believed to stem viral activity in AIDS and we have a recipe for a looming public health disaster. Luckily, in Australia we do not share the added burden of a huge drug-dependent population with HIV/AIDS. Having embraced needle exchange in 1985, we have one of the lowest rates of transmission in the world to intravenous drug users. In a political climate of zero tolerance for drug users, it is a small step to open the gates of infection with HIV to this marginalised group in our midst. Dr Raymond Seidler, Kings Cross. [end]
Naltrexone is not a miracle cure for heroin addiction. It has had 20 years of clinical use with only modest success in the published literature. Patients who are highly motivated and come from white-collar backgrounds, such as lawyers, doctors and nurses, do best on this treatment. The hype associated with rapid detox has clouded rational judgment of Naltrexone. For a drug user's family to provide finance for this treatment, often costing up to $9,000, creates an expectation that is only occasionally fulfilled. [continues 65 words]
It creates a punitive and coercive dimension to a school's role in society. The only reliable drug-testing technique which is tamper proof is hair analysis, which quantifies the drug taken and the amount consumed. It is very expensive. Urine testing requires video surveillance or direct observation to be reliable. This would be an onerous responsibility for a school and could represent an invasion of a student's privacy. Schools would be better served leaving drug detection to the experts and focusing on drug education in an open and inclusive manner. Policing abstinence is an impossibility. It will, inevitably, fail and further entrench the us and them divide between students and their teachers. Dr Raymond Seidler, Kings Cross [end]
If the principal of St Andrew's Cathedral School believes that it is compassionate to drug test students, he should think again. Urine testing even under stringent supervision is fraught with difficulty. It creates a punitive and coercive dimension to a school's role in society. The only reliable drug-testing technique which is tamper proof is hair analysis, which quantifies the drug taken and the amount consumed. It is very expensive. Urine testing requires video surveillance or direct observation to be reliable. [continues 73 words]
The hydraulic rams containing 240,000 ecstasy tablets with nine kilograms of ecstasy powder intercepted by Federal police (Herald, January 12) should cause concern. If this seized shipment from Amsterdam represents a fraction of the psychostimulant trade into Australia, then we have entered an ecstasy epidemic. This drug is now seen as a fashion accessory by young people and is de rigueur at dance parties all over the country. Many kids will take more than one tablet a night and at $50 a dose, there is a handy profit for traffickers. Consumers are able to test for purity in their purchase with a widely available ecstasy test kit, which looks for the active ingredient, MDMA. Regrettably, the Federal police bust will do little to dampen demand. Backyard producers will ply ecstasy look-alikes, often full of impurities, until the next large shipment arrives. Dr Raymond Seidler, Kings Cross. [end]
Who would have thought the Sisters of Charity would run a safe injecting room for addicts? They are to be congratulated, as is the board of the hospital, for their vision in saving countless young Australian lives from overdose death in the lanes and squats around Kings Cross. A clean medically supervised place to inject will reduce blood-borne disease, catastrophe through misplaced injections, and the obligatory beating and robbery that frequently accompany a heroin shot in a dark alley. Hopefully, the wheels of the NSW bureaucracy will grind a little faster to get the place open this year. Dr Raymond Seidler, Kings Cross [end]
They are to be congratulated, as is the board of the hospital, for their vision in saving countless young Australian lives from overdose death in the lanes and squats around Kings Cross. A clean medically supervised place to inject will reduce blood-borne disease, catastrophe through misplaced injections, and the obligatory beating and robbery that frequently accompany a heroin shot in a dark alley. Hopefully, the wheels of the NSW bureaucracy will grind a little faster to get the place open this year. Dr Raymond Seidler, Kings Cross [end]
General Barry McCaffrey, the US drug policy director, has an unenlightened attitude to heroin use (Herald, July 14). His view that addicts feel no emotions and do not love their families is just not true. The grind of amassing money to support a heroin habit depresses and depletes the entire reserve of an addict, both physical and emotional. It alienates a user from family but surprisingly does not extinguish love. Witness the parents of drug users plastering poles with posters of their lost children and the tears of a young user when relating lost opportunities for family life. [continues 104 words]
Dear Editor: General Barry McCaffrey, the US drug policy director, has an unenlightened attitude to heroin use (Herald, July 14). His view that addicts feel no emotions and do not love their families is just not true. The grind of amassing money to support a heroin habit depresses and depletes the entire reserve of an addict, both physical and emotional. It alienates a user from family but surprisingly does not extinguish love. Witness the parents of drug users plastering poles with posters of their lost children and the tears of a young user when relating lost opportunities for family life. [continues 109 words]
A doctor who treats drug users says they have needed a better deal, writes RAYMOND SEIDLER. OVER the past three weeks, strangers have brought into my surgery waiting room a number of heroin-overdosed people unknown to me. After 20 years working in drug and alcohol medicine in the Cross, I have never seen this frequency of overdose victims. These are people who shoot up in streets and laneways in the area around Springfield Mall and are dragged into my surgery by well-meaning bystanders or associates. Previously they have used injection rooms run by the sex industry. These are now closed by police action. [continues 437 words]
Cocaine, once the preserve of the rich and famous, is now beginning to overshadow the established heroin trade in Kings Cross. The staggering demand for a drug that is often taken 10 to 15 times a day has created a dealer fraternity which can turn over thousands of dollars each day. Clad in the newest designer tracksuits with sleek up-to-the-minute mobile phones, they ply their trade up and down Darlinghurst Road all day and night. Young girls preselect for cocaine or "okie doke", as it is known on the street, because it promotes rapid weight loss as a side effect of its well-known short euphoria. A strong psychological dependency is common, often producing psychosis and skin picking to remove imaginary insect infestations. The new popularity of cocaine is fraught with difficulty for doctors. At least with heroin, there are some treatment options available. Nothing seems to successfully overcome an intense craving for this drug. Dr Raymond Seidler, November 30 Potts Point. [end]
There are people in the zero tolerance brigade saying that starter packs with heroin and an injecting kit are available in Sydney for $5. This is patently untrue but serves to alarm the population and heighten fears of the "drug scourge" especially during an election campaign. Raymond Seidler, September 18 Kings Cross. [continues 4 words]
There are people in the zero tolerance brigade saying that starter packs with heroin and an injecting kit are available in Sydney for $5. This is patently untrue but serves to alarm the population and heighten fears of the "drug scourge" especially during an election campaign. Raymond Seidler, September 18 Kings Cross. [end]
