Cocaine Addiction
http://www.cocaine-addiction.co.uk/index.php
Cocaine Addictionen2008-05-10T22:03:19asif@eits.infohourly12000-01-01T12:00+00:00Half of doctors 'self-medicate'!
http://www.cocaine-addiction.co.uk/index.php?p=55&c=1
2007-03-15T17:11:01admin (mailto:asif@eits.info)General Nearly half of GPs are ignoring rules saying they should not prescribe themselves drugs, a poll suggests.
According to Pulse magazine, 43% of doctors write prescriptions for their own personal use, including antibiotics and strong painkillers.
This contravenes General Medical Council advice which says doctors should get a prescription from a professional colleague if they are ill.
The GMC warned a doctor could be struck off its register for breaking the rule.
The rules were tightened following the Shipman Inquiry when the full extent of serial killer GP Harold Shipman's abuse became clear.
Shipman was addicted to the painkiller pethidine and kept supplies for himself.
According to the poll of nearly 1,000 medics, 57% of the self-prescriptions were for antibiotics, 36% for painkillers, 8% for cholesterol-lowering drugs, 5% for sleeping pills, 5% for anti-depressants and 2% for erection problems.
Two GPs who responded admitted to self-prescribing controlled drugs - drugs like morphine and methadone that have strict rules governing supply and dosage.
Younger doctors were particularly likely to self-prescribe, with 49% doing so, according to the survey.
A quarter of the GPs said they were suffering from depression and more than half reported having trouble sleeping.
The GMC says doctors should not treat themselves and should be registered with an independent GP.
Michael Keegan, policy adviser with the GMC's standards and ethics team, warned doctors: "Good practice means you should follow our guidelines. Serious departures will call a doctor's registration into question."
Notice: Undefined variable: tags in C:\Inetpub\wwwwroot\cocaine-addiction.co.uk\b2-include\b2template.functions.php on line 1186 Nearly half of GPs are ignoring rules saying they should not prescribe themselves drugs, a poll suggests.
According to Pulse magazine, 43% of doctors write prescriptions for their own personal use, including antibiotics and strong painkillers.
This contravenes General Medical Council advice which says doctors should get a prescription from a professional colleague if they are ill.
The GMC warned a doctor could be struck off its register for breaking the rule.
The rules were tightened following the Shipman Inquiry when the full extent of serial killer GP Harold Shipman's abuse became clear.
Shipman was addicted to the painkiller pethidine and kept supplies for himself.
According to the poll of nearly 1,000 medics, 57% of the self-prescriptions were for antibiotics, 36% for painkillers, 8% for cholesterol-lowering drugs, 5% for sleeping pills, 5% for anti-depressants and 2% for erection problems.
Two GPs who responded admitted to self-prescribing controlled drugs - drugs like morphine and methadone that have strict rules governing supply and dosage.
Younger doctors were particularly likely to self-prescribe, with 49% doing so, according to the survey.
A quarter of the GPs said they were suffering from depression and more than half reported having trouble sleeping.
The GMC says doctors should not treat themselves and should be registered with an independent GP.
Michael Keegan, policy adviser with the GMC's standards and ethics team, warned doctors: "Good practice means you should follow our guidelines. Serious departures will call a doctor's registration into question." ]]>Revealed: Britain's 12-year-old alcoholics
http://www.cocaine-addiction.co.uk/index.php?p=54&c=1
2007-02-27T19:14:20admin (mailto:asif@eits.info)General Children as young as 12 are being diagnosed as alcoholics amid growing concerns about binge-drinking in Britain, an investigation by The Independent on Sunday revealed.
Record numbers of pre-teens and teenagers now require hospital treatment for drink-related disorders, the exclusive nationwide survey shows.
The findings prove there is a hidden epidemic of child alcoholism, resulting in thousands of youngsters being treated in hospital each year for alcohol poisoning, liver disease and drink-related psychiatric illnesses.
Doctors warn that conditions such as cirrhosis of the liver are now starting to appear in people who are still in their teens, prompting calls for special detoxification clinics to be set up around the country for teenage drinkers.
Dr Sarah Harris, an expert on alcoholism at the Royal College for General Practitioners, said: "There is currently no national provision for youngsters addicted to drink but it would be entirely appropriate to have some adolescent clinics for alcohol abuse."
Dr Claire Casey, head of a new youth detox unit at the private Priory Group, said: "We have children presenting with all the adult symptoms of alcoholism. Some are so addicted that it is actually dangerous to get them to stop drinking straight away.''
New figures reveal that Britain's teenagers are drinking twice as much as they did a decade ago, with half of all 13-year-olds consuming more than 10 units a week. The amount being consumed by 11- to 13-year-olds has gone up almost threefold in the same period, with doctors citing the cultural shift towards 24-hour drinking.
They are also worried that the drinks industry is deliberately targeting the young, promoting alcopops - heavily sweetened, attractively packaged alcoholic drinks - and offering alcohol at historically low prices.
The Independent on Sunday investigation also found that alcohol abuse accounted for more than 8,600 hospital admissions of under-16s last year - the highest ever and a 37 per cent rise on five years ago.
The revelations come hard on the heels of a UN report that said British children were more at risk from alcohol, drugs and unsafe sex than any other wealthy country in the world.
But the figures compiled by IoS only hint at the extent of the problem, according to Professor Mark Bellis, the Government's leading public health adviser on alcohol. He said: "Hospital statistics grossly underestimate the number of young people drinking alcohol in ways that will damage their health. We are in danger of creating a generation permanently scarred by alcohol."
The public health minister, Caroline Flint, said: "We are concerned that more young people are being admitted to hospital via accident and emergency because of acute intoxication.
"It is vital that young people are aware of sensible drinking messages so that as adults they will be responsible drinkers."
But Professor Martin Plant, director of the Alcohol and Health Research Trust, criticised the Government for not standing up to industry interests. He yesterday accused it of being dominated by a "desire to please the drinks industry to an extent that they ignore scientific advice on the long-term dangers".
Notice: Undefined variable: tags in C:\Inetpub\wwwwroot\cocaine-addiction.co.uk\b2-include\b2template.functions.php on line 1186 Children as young as 12 are being diagnosed as alcoholics amid growing concerns about binge-drinking in Britain, an investigation by The Independent on Sunday revealed.
Record numbers of pre-teens and teenagers now require hospital treatment for drink-related disorders, the exclusive nationwide survey shows.
The findings prove there is a hidden epidemic of child alcoholism, resulting in thousands of youngsters being treated in hospital each year for alcohol poisoning, liver disease and drink-related psychiatric illnesses.
Doctors warn that conditions such as cirrhosis of the liver are now starting to appear in people who are still in their teens, prompting calls for special detoxification clinics to be set up around the country for teenage drinkers.
Dr Sarah Harris, an expert on alcoholism at the Royal College for General Practitioners, said: "There is currently no national provision for youngsters addicted to drink but it would be entirely appropriate to have some adolescent clinics for alcohol abuse."
Dr Claire Casey, head of a new youth detox unit at the private Priory Group, said: "We have children presenting with all the adult symptoms of alcoholism. Some are so addicted that it is actually dangerous to get them to stop drinking straight away.''
New figures reveal that Britain's teenagers are drinking twice as much as they did a decade ago, with half of all 13-year-olds consuming more than 10 units a week. The amount being consumed by 11- to 13-year-olds has gone up almost threefold in the same period, with doctors citing the cultural shift towards 24-hour drinking.
They are also worried that the drinks industry is deliberately targeting the young, promoting alcopops - heavily sweetened, attractively packaged alcoholic drinks - and offering alcohol at historically low prices.
The Independent on Sunday investigation also found that alcohol abuse accounted for more than 8,600 hospital admissions of under-16s last year - the highest ever and a 37 per cent rise on five years ago.
The revelations come hard on the heels of a UN report that said British children were more at risk from alcohol, drugs and unsafe sex than any other wealthy country in the world.
But the figures compiled by IoS only hint at the extent of the problem, according to Professor Mark Bellis, the Government's leading public health adviser on alcohol. He said: "Hospital statistics grossly underestimate the number of young people drinking alcohol in ways that will damage their health. We are in danger of creating a generation permanently scarred by alcohol."
The public health minister, Caroline Flint, said: "We are concerned that more young people are being admitted to hospital via accident and emergency because of acute intoxication.
"It is vital that young people are aware of sensible drinking messages so that as adults they will be responsible drinkers."
But Professor Martin Plant, director of the Alcohol and Health Research Trust, criticised the Government for not standing up to industry interests. He yesterday accused it of being dominated by a "desire to please the drinks industry to an extent that they ignore scientific advice on the long-term dangers". ]]>Big rise in number of young people killed by heavy drinking
http://www.cocaine-addiction.co.uk/index.php?p=53&c=1
2007-02-23T11:35:54admin (mailto:asif@eits.info)General The alcopops generation are drinking themselves to death, latest figures show.
Drink-related deaths among 15 to 34-year-olds have increased by almost 60 per cent since 1991. The Office for National Statistics (ONS), which published the figures yesterday, said 198 men and 89 women in this age group died from alcohol poisoning or cirrhosis of the liver in 2004.
Overall, deaths from drinking have doubled in the past 13 years to 8,221 in 2004. These do not include road accidents and other injuries caused by alcohol.
At all ages the death rate among men is twice that for women and the gap between the sexes is widening. Scotland is the worst affected region with a death rate twice that for the rest of the UK.
The Institute of Alcohol Studies said the figures underlined the need to discourage young people from drinking. Director Andrew McNeill said: "Alcohol consumption is going up in Britain, and going down in countries such as France and Italy, because alcohol is cheaper and available at more outlets in this country than ever before. We live in the age of 24-hour licensing and the booze cruise. The consequence is that younger and younger people are appearing in hospital with alcohol-related illnesses."
Jack Law, chief executive of Alcohol Focus Scotland, said: "Forty five Scots are now dying because of drink every single week. We need to ask what is so different about Scotland's drinking culture, compared with the rest of the UK."
The figures came as the Scottish Executive unveiled its Alcohol Action Plan to target binge-drinking. Scotland's health minister, Andy Kerr, announced that a crackdown on owners of licensed premises selling alcohol to under-age drinkers would be rolled out across Scotland.
Alcohol-related death rates were five times higher among men in the most deprived areas and three times higher among women. Mr Law said: "Much more work needs to be done to reach people in the most deprived social groups because they are most likely to die from alcohol abuse."
Glasgow had the highest alcohol-related death rate among both men and women. Fifteen of the 20 local areas with the highest death rates were in Scotland, with three in England and two in Northern Ireland. Wales was the only country to have no local areas with a very high death rate.
Surveys have shown little change in the number of men reporting drinking more than 21 units a week or women drinking more than 14 units. The ONS says it is possible that the rise in deaths is related to binge drinking or changes in the type of alcohol consumed, especially by the young.
The Government changed its guidelines on sensible drinking in 1995 from weekly to daily benchmarks - three or four units a day for men and two or three for women - to tackle binge drinking. Surveys since have shown no change in the number of binge drinkers, but researchers say they are unreliable because heavy drinkers tend to underestimate how much they drink.
Notice: Undefined variable: tags in C:\Inetpub\wwwwroot\cocaine-addiction.co.uk\b2-include\b2template.functions.php on line 1186 The alcopops generation are drinking themselves to death, latest figures show.
Drink-related deaths among 15 to 34-year-olds have increased by almost 60 per cent since 1991. The Office for National Statistics (ONS), which published the figures yesterday, said 198 men and 89 women in this age group died from alcohol poisoning or cirrhosis of the liver in 2004.
Overall, deaths from drinking have doubled in the past 13 years to 8,221 in 2004. These do not include road accidents and other injuries caused by alcohol.
At all ages the death rate among men is twice that for women and the gap between the sexes is widening. Scotland is the worst affected region with a death rate twice that for the rest of the UK.
The Institute of Alcohol Studies said the figures underlined the need to discourage young people from drinking. Director Andrew McNeill said: "Alcohol consumption is going up in Britain, and going down in countries such as France and Italy, because alcohol is cheaper and available at more outlets in this country than ever before. We live in the age of 24-hour licensing and the booze cruise. The consequence is that younger and younger people are appearing in hospital with alcohol-related illnesses."
Jack Law, chief executive of Alcohol Focus Scotland, said: "Forty five Scots are now dying because of drink every single week. We need to ask what is so different about Scotland's drinking culture, compared with the rest of the UK."
The figures came as the Scottish Executive unveiled its Alcohol Action Plan to target binge-drinking. Scotland's health minister, Andy Kerr, announced that a crackdown on owners of licensed premises selling alcohol to under-age drinkers would be rolled out across Scotland.
Alcohol-related death rates were five times higher among men in the most deprived areas and three times higher among women. Mr Law said: "Much more work needs to be done to reach people in the most deprived social groups because they are most likely to die from alcohol abuse."
Glasgow had the highest alcohol-related death rate among both men and women. Fifteen of the 20 local areas with the highest death rates were in Scotland, with three in England and two in Northern Ireland. Wales was the only country to have no local areas with a very high death rate.
Surveys have shown little change in the number of men reporting drinking more than 21 units a week or women drinking more than 14 units. The ONS says it is possible that the rise in deaths is related to binge drinking or changes in the type of alcohol consumed, especially by the young.
The Government changed its guidelines on sensible drinking in 1995 from weekly to daily benchmarks - three or four units a day for men and two or three for women - to tackle binge drinking. Surveys since have shown no change in the number of binge drinkers, but researchers say they are unreliable because heavy drinkers tend to underestimate how much they drink. ]]>HAPPY NEW YEAR
http://www.cocaine-addiction.co.uk/index.php?p=52&c=1
2007-01-02T18:19:06admin (mailto:asif@eits.info)General We would like to take this opportunity to wish everyone a HAPPY NEW YEAR for 2007. We hope your year will be full of peace, stillness and joy.
Lots of love
The New Choices Team :o) Notice: Undefined variable: tags in C:\Inetpub\wwwwroot\cocaine-addiction.co.uk\b2-include\b2template.functions.php on line 1186 We would like to take this opportunity to wish everyone a HAPPY NEW YEAR for 2007. We hope your year will be full of peace, stillness and joy.
Lots of love
The New Choices Team :o)]]>A nation addicted: Cocaine - Britain's deadly habit
http://www.cocaine-addiction.co.uk/index.php?p=51&c=1
2006-11-22T12:41:20admin (mailto:asif@eits.info)General A major new report shows that 1.75 million young adults use a drug that most think is harmless. But 171 people have died from its use last year, an increase of 300 per cent in five years.
"I was snorting cocaine like a pig," says Tim Burgess. "Everyone was worried and thought I had a month to live." Coke was easy to get hold of. After all Burgess was the lead singer of the Charlatans, at the time one of Britain's biggest bands. He was so in thrall to "charlie" that he was snorting huge amounts of the drug "morning, noon and late into the night".
What had started as recreational use when he was 22 years old became a 17-year-habit that escalated into a serious addiction. The singer, now 39, was so paranoid and withdrawn that he was barely able to function.
Burgess, who has lived in Los Angeles for the past few years, has been clean for seven months since coming to London for treatment in April. He is the latest of a slew of celebrities baring their souls about bitter struggles with cocaine, but aspects of his story will resonate with thousands of Britons.
Figures to be released this Thursday by the European Monitoring Centre on Drugs and Drugs Addiction (EMCDDA), which reports on drug use, will show that the UK is in the top three for the number of cocaine users in Europe. The figures are based on evidence from 29 countries including Spain and France.
And findings submitted to the EMCDDA by UK government officials and drug experts paint a frightening picture of soaring cocaine abuse in the UK. They warn that although use of most class A drugs increases by relatively small amounts, the number of people taking cocaine has soared.
The last decade has seen use of the drug almost triple among UK adults. Over the same period, ecstasy use, for example, has fallen and although cannabis use is much more widespread in society, its use hasn't increased by anything like as much as cocaine.
Crack cocaine seizures have increased by 74 per cent since 2000 and the number of people arrested or cautioned for cocaine offences rose to 8,165 in 2003. Between April 2002 and December 2003 customs seized more than 26,000kg of cocaine.
The UK report shows that use of cocaine has risen more than any other drug.
In a statement, Antonio Maria Costa, executive director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, warned of a "staggering" rise in the number of Britons using the drug. He said there was "a steadily growing number of Britons... are being seduced by the 'white lady'. Either Europe snaps out of its state of denial," he warns, "or it should brace itself for the consequences".
Despite a constant stream of such dire warnings, coke has maintained its image as a drug associated with a celebrity lifestyle and does not have the stigma that surrounds other class A drugs such as heroin. The drug's image has been given a boost by Kate Moss's apparent transformation from shamed coke snorter to style icon in the space of less than 12 months.
She was temporarily ditched from several high-profile modelling contracts after a national newspaper published pictures apparently showing her using the class A drug in a west London recording studio last year. But her earnings this year were her highest ever, with a whole range of new contracts and endorsements.
A potent combination of image and lower prices has helped fuel cocaine's soaring popularity not just at home but also abroad. In the case of the Ibiza set, more than three-quarters say they have taken the drug, compared with only half last year. In contrast, there has only been a small percentage rise in the number of users of ecstasy, which once dominated the club scene.
The cost of cocaine has nearly halved over the past decade, which has given rise to an alarming trend in bingeing on the drug because people are getting more cocaine for their money. Professor Mark Bellis, Director for the Centre for Public Health at Liverpool John Moores University, argues, "Cocaine used to be regarded as a high-class drug but it is far more available and affordable now."
Cocaine is fast replacing ecstasy as the drug of choice on the club scene for the first time, with record numbers of young people snorting the powder for as little as £30 a gram.
Nearly one in 10 people in their twenties who go to clubs admits to taking two grams in a session - the equivalent of 40 lines.
These figures are based on a survey of more than 2,000 regular club-goers across the country, ranging from students to civil servants, carried out by the magazine Mixmag, seen as the clubbers' Bible.
Clubs, keen to avoid getting labelled as magnets for drug users, have introduced special amnesty bins in a bid to encourage people to hand over their drugs, without fear of police action, before a night out.
Health ministers and educationalists continually sound alarms about teenagers becoming hooked on the drug. Cocaine has been in schools for many years but is becoming so common that a number of schools are seriously considering bringing in drug testing of pupils.
In one case, four teenage girls were expelled from a school in West Sussex after snorting the drug in the toilets before lessons. Police gave two pupils a warning after being alerted by staff at Holy Trinity School in Gossops Green, Crawley.
Rebecca Smith (not her real name), a former pupil at Fortismere School in London, is now 20 and has already seen how cocaine use has increased since she left school, "Coke was everywhere... and since I've left people say that it's got even worse. There are always trends with drugs and at the moment cocaine is seen at the coolest."
Even more worryingly, the drug has graduated from weekend recreational to a daily staple for increasing numbers. September marked an increase of 3,000 per cent in the number of workers caught with cocaine in their system over the past decade.
This is particularly significant because drugs like cocaine are swiftly flushed out of the system and can be hard to detect, indicating that users are high during the working week, not just at weekends.
Anti-addiction charities now fear that in the hunt for a harder high, users will progress to crack cocaine. Harry Shapiro from the charity Drugscope said, "It would appear that cocaine is increasingly the class A drug of choice but there is a danger that some of these cocaine users will become crack users."
London is now the cocaine capital of the world, according to a UN report published earlier this year which revealed that one in 50 people have used cocaine in Britain - a higher figure than anywhere else in the world, including countries such as the United States. Sir Ian Blair, the Metropolitan Police commissioner, earlier this year announced a clampdown on middle-class cocaine users.
In response to the explosion in cocaine use, Scotland Yard has taken the unprecedented step of using undercover officers to pose as drug suppliers in a bid to target recreational users.
Increasingly, cocaine is taking a toll on users' health. Latest figures from the National Programme on Substance Abuse Deaths show that the proportion of cocaine-related drug deaths has risen year on year since they began collecting records of drug deaths in 1999.
The drug now accounts for more than 13 per cent of deaths, with 171 cocaine-related deaths in 2005.
This week, the Association of Chief Police Officers will be holding its annual conference on drugs at which Britain's cocaine crisis will be discussed.
Experts are also worried about a new trend among addicts of injecting cocaine, a technique used by heroin users, to increase the hit from the drug.
There has been a huge rise in deaths and the Government needs to do more to educate people about the dangers, including recreational users, according to Professor John Henry, a leading expert on drugs at St Mary's Hospital in London.
"People need to know that not only can you die from first use but that you are also going to end up with arteries like a 60 year old and with brain damage," he said. "There should be primary prevention like there is in preventing cancer."
Combined alcohol and cocaine use is becoming a major concern to health services and drug and alcohol treatment agencies. Addaction, a drug and alcohol treatment charity, believes the cocaethylene issue will emerge as a major health problem, namely liver failure, in the future if "recreational" coke users who go out binge drinking are not fully aware of the trouble they are storing up for their bodies. Although there have been awareness campaigns about drink spiking and personal safety, the charity warns that young recreational drug and alcohol users need to be made aware of the dangers of combining different drugs, such as cocaine and alcohol.
Tim Burgess needs no such warnings. His body is paying the price for years of cocaine abuse. He is on medication for problems with his kidneys and a swollen liver and reflects, "My white powder dreams turned into a nightmare. I was just toying with myself, dancing with the devil ... dancing with death ... I just lost control."
Notice: Undefined variable: tags in C:\Inetpub\wwwwroot\cocaine-addiction.co.uk\b2-include\b2template.functions.php on line 1186 A major new report shows that 1.75 million young adults use a drug that most think is harmless. But 171 people have died from its use last year, an increase of 300 per cent in five years.
"I was snorting cocaine like a pig," says Tim Burgess. "Everyone was worried and thought I had a month to live." Coke was easy to get hold of. After all Burgess was the lead singer of the Charlatans, at the time one of Britain's biggest bands. He was so in thrall to "charlie" that he was snorting huge amounts of the drug "morning, noon and late into the night".
What had started as recreational use when he was 22 years old became a 17-year-habit that escalated into a serious addiction. The singer, now 39, was so paranoid and withdrawn that he was barely able to function.
Burgess, who has lived in Los Angeles for the past few years, has been clean for seven months since coming to London for treatment in April. He is the latest of a slew of celebrities baring their souls about bitter struggles with cocaine, but aspects of his story will resonate with thousands of Britons.
Figures to be released this Thursday by the European Monitoring Centre on Drugs and Drugs Addiction (EMCDDA), which reports on drug use, will show that the UK is in the top three for the number of cocaine users in Europe. The figures are based on evidence from 29 countries including Spain and France.
And findings submitted to the EMCDDA by UK government officials and drug experts paint a frightening picture of soaring cocaine abuse in the UK. They warn that although use of most class A drugs increases by relatively small amounts, the number of people taking cocaine has soared.
The last decade has seen use of the drug almost triple among UK adults. Over the same period, ecstasy use, for example, has fallen and although cannabis use is much more widespread in society, its use hasn't increased by anything like as much as cocaine.
Crack cocaine seizures have increased by 74 per cent since 2000 and the number of people arrested or cautioned for cocaine offences rose to 8,165 in 2003. Between April 2002 and December 2003 customs seized more than 26,000kg of cocaine.
The UK report shows that use of cocaine has risen more than any other drug.
In a statement, Antonio Maria Costa, executive director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, warned of a "staggering" rise in the number of Britons using the drug. He said there was "a steadily growing number of Britons... are being seduced by the 'white lady'. Either Europe snaps out of its state of denial," he warns, "or it should brace itself for the consequences".
Despite a constant stream of such dire warnings, coke has maintained its image as a drug associated with a celebrity lifestyle and does not have the stigma that surrounds other class A drugs such as heroin. The drug's image has been given a boost by Kate Moss's apparent transformation from shamed coke snorter to style icon in the space of less than 12 months.
She was temporarily ditched from several high-profile modelling contracts after a national newspaper published pictures apparently showing her using the class A drug in a west London recording studio last year. But her earnings this year were her highest ever, with a whole range of new contracts and endorsements.
A potent combination of image and lower prices has helped fuel cocaine's soaring popularity not just at home but also abroad. In the case of the Ibiza set, more than three-quarters say they have taken the drug, compared with only half last year. In contrast, there has only been a small percentage rise in the number of users of ecstasy, which once dominated the club scene.
The cost of cocaine has nearly halved over the past decade, which has given rise to an alarming trend in bingeing on the drug because people are getting more cocaine for their money. Professor Mark Bellis, Director for the Centre for Public Health at Liverpool John Moores University, argues, "Cocaine used to be regarded as a high-class drug but it is far more available and affordable now."
Cocaine is fast replacing ecstasy as the drug of choice on the club scene for the first time, with record numbers of young people snorting the powder for as little as £30 a gram.
Nearly one in 10 people in their twenties who go to clubs admits to taking two grams in a session - the equivalent of 40 lines.
These figures are based on a survey of more than 2,000 regular club-goers across the country, ranging from students to civil servants, carried out by the magazine Mixmag, seen as the clubbers' Bible.
Clubs, keen to avoid getting labelled as magnets for drug users, have introduced special amnesty bins in a bid to encourage people to hand over their drugs, without fear of police action, before a night out.
Health ministers and educationalists continually sound alarms about teenagers becoming hooked on the drug. Cocaine has been in schools for many years but is becoming so common that a number of schools are seriously considering bringing in drug testing of pupils.
In one case, four teenage girls were expelled from a school in West Sussex after snorting the drug in the toilets before lessons. Police gave two pupils a warning after being alerted by staff at Holy Trinity School in Gossops Green, Crawley.
Rebecca Smith (not her real name), a former pupil at Fortismere School in London, is now 20 and has already seen how cocaine use has increased since she left school, "Coke was everywhere... and since I've left people say that it's got even worse. There are always trends with drugs and at the moment cocaine is seen at the coolest."
Even more worryingly, the drug has graduated from weekend recreational to a daily staple for increasing numbers. September marked an increase of 3,000 per cent in the number of workers caught with cocaine in their system over the past decade.
This is particularly significant because drugs like cocaine are swiftly flushed out of the system and can be hard to detect, indicating that users are high during the working week, not just at weekends.
Anti-addiction charities now fear that in the hunt for a harder high, users will progress to crack cocaine. Harry Shapiro from the charity Drugscope said, "It would appear that cocaine is increasingly the class A drug of choice but there is a danger that some of these cocaine users will become crack users."
London is now the cocaine capital of the world, according to a UN report published earlier this year which revealed that one in 50 people have used cocaine in Britain - a higher figure than anywhere else in the world, including countries such as the United States. Sir Ian Blair, the Metropolitan Police commissioner, earlier this year announced a clampdown on middle-class cocaine users.
In response to the explosion in cocaine use, Scotland Yard has taken the unprecedented step of using undercover officers to pose as drug suppliers in a bid to target recreational users.
Increasingly, cocaine is taking a toll on users' health. Latest figures from the National Programme on Substance Abuse Deaths show that the proportion of cocaine-related drug deaths has risen year on year since they began collecting records of drug deaths in 1999.
The drug now accounts for more than 13 per cent of deaths, with 171 cocaine-related deaths in 2005.
This week, the Association of Chief Police Officers will be holding its annual conference on drugs at which Britain's cocaine crisis will be discussed.
Experts are also worried about a new trend among addicts of injecting cocaine, a technique used by heroin users, to increase the hit from the drug.
There has been a huge rise in deaths and the Government needs to do more to educate people about the dangers, including recreational users, according to Professor John Henry, a leading expert on drugs at St Mary's Hospital in London.
"People need to know that not only can you die from first use but that you are also going to end up with arteries like a 60 year old and with brain damage," he said. "There should be primary prevention like there is in preventing cancer."
Combined alcohol and cocaine use is becoming a major concern to health services and drug and alcohol treatment agencies. Addaction, a drug and alcohol treatment charity, believes the cocaethylene issue will emerge as a major health problem, namely liver failure, in the future if "recreational" coke users who go out binge drinking are not fully aware of the trouble they are storing up for their bodies. Although there have been awareness campaigns about drink spiking and personal safety, the charity warns that young recreational drug and alcohol users need to be made aware of the dangers of combining different drugs, such as cocaine and alcohol.
Tim Burgess needs no such warnings. His body is paying the price for years of cocaine abuse. He is on medication for problems with his kidneys and a swollen liver and reflects, "My white powder dreams turned into a nightmare. I was just toying with myself, dancing with the devil ... dancing with death ... I just lost control." ]]>The New Choices Forum
http://www.cocaine-addiction.co.uk/index.php?p=50&c=1
2006-07-27T21:53:45admin (mailto:asif@eits.info)General We are sorry to say that due to the continued and ever more frequent spamming we have been receiving on the forum of late, it has been decided that it has to close. Day in day out we were being bombarded by hundreds and hundreds of spammers leaving links for all sorts of porn sites, loan companies and more worryingly, online gambling sites and umpteen online pharmacies and despite trying to reason with them, our requests to stop fell on deaf ears. We hope all those of you who used the forum will continue to find other ways of supporting each other and if there is any chance of getting it back online at any point, we shall of course let you know. Notice: Undefined variable: tags in C:\Inetpub\wwwwroot\cocaine-addiction.co.uk\b2-include\b2template.functions.php on line 1186 We are sorry to say that due to the continued and ever more frequent spamming we have been receiving on the forum of late, it has been decided that it has to close. Day in day out we were being bombarded by hundreds and hundreds of spammers leaving links for all sorts of porn sites, loan companies and more worryingly, online gambling sites and umpteen online pharmacies and despite trying to reason with them, our requests to stop fell on deaf ears. We hope all those of you who used the forum will continue to find other ways of supporting each other and if there is any chance of getting it back online at any point, we shall of course let you know.]]>The terrible toll cocaine has taken on Tara's face
http://www.cocaine-addiction.co.uk/index.php?p=49&c=1
2006-07-04T12:59:20admin (mailto:asif@eits.info)General Years of cocaine abuse appears to have finally caught up with Tara Palmer-Tomkinson, after shocking photographs revealed her once perfect nose to be on the brink of collapse.
Appearing at the Grazia Lifetime Achievement awards last night, guests were horrified to see a large dent on the bridge of her nose. One guest said: "Tara was dressed up and looked terrific, but her nose was in a terrible state. I couldn't stop staring at it because it had such a strange indentation. It was the talk of the party."
Friends of the I'm A Celebrity star, who has been clean for more than six years, now fear her former £400-a-day drug habit may have left her scarred for life.
Tara has frequently spoken of the damage her past cocaine addiction has caused, "I've given myself a nose job because of all the cocaine I shoved up it," she said. "My cartilage is gone. I just have fresh air."
And she revealed how her habit almost brought her to the brink of death. "I was a dead woman walking. I needed help, or I knew I was going to die. I would do more than five grams of coke a day. In the end, I didn't do lines - I did the whole lot as one. I threw the stuff in the air and sniffed clouds of it.
Following her bizarre appearance on the Frank Skinner Show, where she appeared dishevelled and disorientated, she checked herself into the famous Meadows Clinic in the US, saying: "It's a simple choice between life and death and I've chosen life."
Alex Karidis, a plastic surgeon who viewed the pictures, said: "It appears her nose is collapsing. It looks as if the lower part of Tara's nose, including the septum, has collapsed. The bridge has a slight bump too. The only way you get this kind of effect is by using cocaine quite heavily - or from boxing."
Unlike former EastEnder Danniella Westbrook, 32, who underwent the knife to correct the damage to her septum caused by cocaine abuse, Tara says she is afraid of surgery.
She said: "I don't like the hole in my nose, but an operation would hurt. I'm not a great believer in surgery. I think that behind the odd wrinkle or scar there is a good story to be told."
Notice: Undefined variable: tags in C:\Inetpub\wwwwroot\cocaine-addiction.co.uk\b2-include\b2template.functions.php on line 1186 Years of cocaine abuse appears to have finally caught up with Tara Palmer-Tomkinson, after shocking photographs revealed her once perfect nose to be on the brink of collapse.
Appearing at the Grazia Lifetime Achievement awards last night, guests were horrified to see a large dent on the bridge of her nose. One guest said: "Tara was dressed up and looked terrific, but her nose was in a terrible state. I couldn't stop staring at it because it had such a strange indentation. It was the talk of the party."
Friends of the I'm A Celebrity star, who has been clean for more than six years, now fear her former £400-a-day drug habit may have left her scarred for life.
Tara has frequently spoken of the damage her past cocaine addiction has caused, "I've given myself a nose job because of all the cocaine I shoved up it," she said. "My cartilage is gone. I just have fresh air."
And she revealed how her habit almost brought her to the brink of death. "I was a dead woman walking. I needed help, or I knew I was going to die. I would do more than five grams of coke a day. In the end, I didn't do lines - I did the whole lot as one. I threw the stuff in the air and sniffed clouds of it.
Following her bizarre appearance on the Frank Skinner Show, where she appeared dishevelled and disorientated, she checked herself into the famous Meadows Clinic in the US, saying: "It's a simple choice between life and death and I've chosen life."
Alex Karidis, a plastic surgeon who viewed the pictures, said: "It appears her nose is collapsing. It looks as if the lower part of Tara's nose, including the septum, has collapsed. The bridge has a slight bump too. The only way you get this kind of effect is by using cocaine quite heavily - or from boxing."
Unlike former EastEnder Danniella Westbrook, 32, who underwent the knife to correct the damage to her septum caused by cocaine abuse, Tara says she is afraid of surgery.
She said: "I don't like the hole in my nose, but an operation would hurt. I'm not a great believer in surgery. I think that behind the odd wrinkle or scar there is a good story to be told." ]]>Make mine a large one!
http://www.cocaine-addiction.co.uk/index.php?p=48&c=1
2006-06-06T11:54:12admin (mailto:asif@eits.info)General The trend towards drinking from huge wine glasses at home is turning some people into "unwitting" alcoholics, an addiction expert has warned. Extra large wine measures that are poured in pubs are also adding to the growing levels of problem drinkers.
Nick Gully, the director of addiction services at the Priory Clinic in Roehampton, where numerous celebrities have been treated, said the relaxation of licensing laws had "normalised" excess drinking and would lead to more people becoming dependent on alcohol.
"The size of measures and glasses have grown in recent years. People have become used to these outsized glasses. They fill them up and believe it's OK because they are only having one glass, but that can now amount to a third of a bottle. If they have a small glass, they feel cheated. It's the same in pubs. Someone goes to a bar and feels cheated if they are given a small glass. People expect larger measures. They have become normalised and, with it, the amount of alcohol we drink has gone up and has become normalised by society as well." said Gully.
"Five or 10 years ago, the average age of our patients who had an alcohol problem was about 45; now it is about 35 and we are seeing people as young as 18 who are alcoholics. We were used to treating people who, when we looked, had an underlying psychological trauma or a major psychological problem which had contributed to their addiction but we are now seeing patients who don't have that history. They are well-adjusted, functioning people who have inadvertently and unwittingly developed a problem over time. Often they will say that they do not have a problem and that they only drink one or two glasses of wine a night. But when we look at them in depth they have a psychological and physical dependence on alcohol."
Government guidelines recommend that women drink a maximum of two to three units a day and men up to three or four. A small, 125ml glass of wine contains one unit of alcohol but a standard pub measure was increased to 175ml last year and larger glasses may contain as much as 250ml. Many stores are also increasingly selling much larger, goblet style wine glasses that can hold up to half a bottle.
Mr Gully said he believed that the relaxation of licensing laws would lead to an "accumulative" rise in problem drinking.Notice: Undefined variable: tags in C:\Inetpub\wwwwroot\cocaine-addiction.co.uk\b2-include\b2template.functions.php on line 1186 The trend towards drinking from huge wine glasses at home is turning some people into "unwitting" alcoholics, an addiction expert has warned. Extra large wine measures that are poured in pubs are also adding to the growing levels of problem drinkers.
Nick Gully, the director of addiction services at the Priory Clinic in Roehampton, where numerous celebrities have been treated, said the relaxation of licensing laws had "normalised" excess drinking and would lead to more people becoming dependent on alcohol.
"The size of measures and glasses have grown in recent years. People have become used to these outsized glasses. They fill them up and believe it's OK because they are only having one glass, but that can now amount to a third of a bottle. If they have a small glass, they feel cheated. It's the same in pubs. Someone goes to a bar and feels cheated if they are given a small glass. People expect larger measures. They have become normalised and, with it, the amount of alcohol we drink has gone up and has become normalised by society as well." said Gully.
"Five or 10 years ago, the average age of our patients who had an alcohol problem was about 45; now it is about 35 and we are seeing people as young as 18 who are alcoholics. We were used to treating people who, when we looked, had an underlying psychological trauma or a major psychological problem which had contributed to their addiction but we are now seeing patients who don't have that history. They are well-adjusted, functioning people who have inadvertently and unwittingly developed a problem over time. Often they will say that they do not have a problem and that they only drink one or two glasses of wine a night. But when we look at them in depth they have a psychological and physical dependence on alcohol."
Government guidelines recommend that women drink a maximum of two to three units a day and men up to three or four. A small, 125ml glass of wine contains one unit of alcohol but a standard pub measure was increased to 175ml last year and larger glasses may contain as much as 250ml. Many stores are also increasingly selling much larger, goblet style wine glasses that can hold up to half a bottle.
Mr Gully said he believed that the relaxation of licensing laws would lead to an "accumulative" rise in problem drinking.]]>Just one more
http://www.cocaine-addiction.co.uk/index.php?p=47&c=1
2006-06-02T11:33:48admin (mailto:asif@eits.info)General What's claimed to be the first in-patient clinic for computer game addicts in Europe is to open next month, while the Priory clinic is warning about super-sized wine glasses. Are we addicted to more than we like to admit?
"There were 15 year olds being brought to us who were showing the same behaviour as 50-year-old gambling addicts," says Keith Bakker, director of an addiction consultancy in Amsterdam, Holland.
Except the compulsion of these youths - almost always boys - was playing computer games.
"We knew about drugs like crack, but we couldn't find a programme anywhere for kids like this," he says. "And we saw enormous parallels between problems with gaming and alcohol and gambling."
As such, the Smith and Jones consultancy has set up its own treatment centre - an eight-bed residential unit, where Mr Bakker says patients will need to spend four to eight weeks.
The youngsters, who might have been spending almost all their waking hours playing computer games, will experience symptoms of withdrawal, he says. "There can be anxiety, panic attacks, sleep problems, dreaming about games, nightmares, shaking."
The consultancy is already seeing about a dozen "outpatient" youngsters each month who have both a drug and computer game addiction - but increasingly there are calls from youngsters who have gaming as their primary problem.
These screen obsessives are often awkward adolescents who "want to escape reality", he says. They lack social contact, their parents might be divorced or too busy to see them, they might lack confidence. In short, they need to get out more.
But Mr Bakker says that parents shouldn't underestimate the seriousness of the problem.
"This can get totally out of control. These games can be designed to keep the players going, there's no pay-off, it's like climbing a mountain with no top. They're not in their rooms playing games about collecting flowers. They're up there for 18 hours a day playing computer games about killing people."
The treatment will mean intervening in this obsessive pattern, understanding the underlying issues and changing the direction of their behaviour. But it requires a different approach from tackling drug addiction.
"You can't do a urine test to see that they're not still gaming. And if a coke addict said they wanted to go out to a club or to see people, we'd be worried about whether they'd meet a dealer. But if a gamer said he wanted to go out for the night and meet people we'd throw a party."
But adults who have never been troubled by computer-generated mayhem shouldn't be smug. Because Mr Bakker says that dependencies are much more common than we like to admit - and the vast majority of addictions of all kinds remain unrecognised.
You don't have to be a stereotypical junkie or a nighthawk in a casino to be an addict.
Mobile phones and texting can become a compulsion - leaving us feeling vulnerable and panicked when we're not able to send a message or make a call.
"My own mobile phone fell in the canal and I freaked out," he says. And anyone unable to resist text messaging is looking for the same instant gratification, the same quick fix.
There are other forms of compulsion than can slip below the radar - not least because they seem so respectable and unsurprising.
What could be more the hallmark of a busy professional than opening a bottle of wine each night? It's been a tough day, you deserve it. Sounds familiar?
Except that Nick Gully, director of addiction services at the Priory clinic in south-west London, says that the overall increase in wine consumption, and the social acceptability of a bottle before bedtime, can mask more serious drinking problems.
"People have more disposable income and we work at such a fast pace - and people will come home and have a glass of wine - and there's no problem with that," he says.
But he warns that for some drinkers, behind the "just a glass after work" can be a progression to an increasing number of bottles each night.
"We're noticing more people who have alcohol problems without realising it. The normalisation of drinking in this way can conceal it."
It doesn't help that the wine glasses we're using now have been supersized to the dimensions of a small vase, he says, "more like beer glasses on stems". The alcohol volumes rise, one glass turns into several bottles and the risks of a drinking problem increase alongside.
But there are warnings against any exaggeration of the extent of addictions - particularly claims about widespread addiction to various forms of technology.
Mark Griffiths, a psychologist at Nottingham Trent University, says that while there might be people who are "excessive" users of the internet or text messaging, there are very few who are really addicted.
He argues that there is a distinction to be drawn between addiction and "habitual" behaviour - and that for genuine addiction, such as for gambling or alcohol, it's a much tougher proposition.
And if people are compulsive users of online gambling sites, sitting at the screen day and night - it's the gambling that is the addiction and not the technology.
But Mr Bakker says he's watched gaming obsessives behave when they get close to the object of their desire. "It's like the coke user coming up to the dealer, you can see them start to sweat."
By Sean Coughlan
BBC News Magazine
Notice: Undefined variable: tags in C:\Inetpub\wwwwroot\cocaine-addiction.co.uk\b2-include\b2template.functions.php on line 1186 What's claimed to be the first in-patient clinic for computer game addicts in Europe is to open next month, while the Priory clinic is warning about super-sized wine glasses. Are we addicted to more than we like to admit?
"There were 15 year olds being brought to us who were showing the same behaviour as 50-year-old gambling addicts," says Keith Bakker, director of an addiction consultancy in Amsterdam, Holland.
Except the compulsion of these youths - almost always boys - was playing computer games.
"We knew about drugs like crack, but we couldn't find a programme anywhere for kids like this," he says. "And we saw enormous parallels between problems with gaming and alcohol and gambling."
As such, the Smith and Jones consultancy has set up its own treatment centre - an eight-bed residential unit, where Mr Bakker says patients will need to spend four to eight weeks.
The youngsters, who might have been spending almost all their waking hours playing computer games, will experience symptoms of withdrawal, he says. "There can be anxiety, panic attacks, sleep problems, dreaming about games, nightmares, shaking."
The consultancy is already seeing about a dozen "outpatient" youngsters each month who have both a drug and computer game addiction - but increasingly there are calls from youngsters who have gaming as their primary problem.
These screen obsessives are often awkward adolescents who "want to escape reality", he says. They lack social contact, their parents might be divorced or too busy to see them, they might lack confidence. In short, they need to get out more.
But Mr Bakker says that parents shouldn't underestimate the seriousness of the problem.
"This can get totally out of control. These games can be designed to keep the players going, there's no pay-off, it's like climbing a mountain with no top. They're not in their rooms playing games about collecting flowers. They're up there for 18 hours a day playing computer games about killing people."
The treatment will mean intervening in this obsessive pattern, understanding the underlying issues and changing the direction of their behaviour. But it requires a different approach from tackling drug addiction.
"You can't do a urine test to see that they're not still gaming. And if a coke addict said they wanted to go out to a club or to see people, we'd be worried about whether they'd meet a dealer. But if a gamer said he wanted to go out for the night and meet people we'd throw a party."
But adults who have never been troubled by computer-generated mayhem shouldn't be smug. Because Mr Bakker says that dependencies are much more common than we like to admit - and the vast majority of addictions of all kinds remain unrecognised.
You don't have to be a stereotypical junkie or a nighthawk in a casino to be an addict.
Mobile phones and texting can become a compulsion - leaving us feeling vulnerable and panicked when we're not able to send a message or make a call.
"My own mobile phone fell in the canal and I freaked out," he says. And anyone unable to resist text messaging is looking for the same instant gratification, the same quick fix.
There are other forms of compulsion than can slip below the radar - not least because they seem so respectable and unsurprising.
What could be more the hallmark of a busy professional than opening a bottle of wine each night? It's been a tough day, you deserve it. Sounds familiar?
Except that Nick Gully, director of addiction services at the Priory clinic in south-west London, says that the overall increase in wine consumption, and the social acceptability of a bottle before bedtime, can mask more serious drinking problems.
"People have more disposable income and we work at such a fast pace - and people will come home and have a glass of wine - and there's no problem with that," he says.
But he warns that for some drinkers, behind the "just a glass after work" can be a progression to an increasing number of bottles each night.
"We're noticing more people who have alcohol problems without realising it. The normalisation of drinking in this way can conceal it."
It doesn't help that the wine glasses we're using now have been supersized to the dimensions of a small vase, he says, "more like beer glasses on stems". The alcohol volumes rise, one glass turns into several bottles and the risks of a drinking problem increase alongside.
But there are warnings against any exaggeration of the extent of addictions - particularly claims about widespread addiction to various forms of technology.
Mark Griffiths, a psychologist at Nottingham Trent University, says that while there might be people who are "excessive" users of the internet or text messaging, there are very few who are really addicted.
He argues that there is a distinction to be drawn between addiction and "habitual" behaviour - and that for genuine addiction, such as for gambling or alcohol, it's a much tougher proposition.
And if people are compulsive users of online gambling sites, sitting at the screen day and night - it's the gambling that is the addiction and not the technology.
But Mr Bakker says he's watched gaming obsessives behave when they get close to the object of their desire. "It's like the coke user coming up to the dealer, you can see them start to sweat."
Meditation may be spiritual for some, but the practice is not necessarily religious in nature. There are many meditative approaches but regardless of the technique, medical research indicates that the practice of meditation tends to evoke a state of physiological relaxation: blood pressure drops, heart beats slower and breathing is quieter, other biochemical changes can also occur. Scientists do not understand why the changes happen but understanding the physical effects can explain the potential health benefits of meditation.
Twenty minutes of daily meditation can provide relief for ailments such as low back pain, headaches, depression and anxiety. Suffers of these chronic conditions should attempt to incorporate the meditation practice into their daily routine. If meditation can lower blood pressure, it could be a useful tool in helping patients with hypertension. If scientists uncover exactly how meditation works to relieve these symptoms, they may be able to apply that understanding to treat a variety of other disorders.
Research on meditation began back in the late 1960s. Herbert Benson, MD, began studying the physiological impact of Transcendental Meditation on individuals. In recent years, the scope of studies has focused on how the practice can reduce symptoms of chronic illnesses from cardiovascular disease to cancer. Critics indicate some of the research is been on small study populations and has not had adequate control groups for comparison. But some studies have shown promising results.
Meditation can relax the body. Promote more restful sleep and boost the body’s immune system. This will help fight illness and better manage the symptoms of chronic conditions. Meditation can relax the mind and help us better deal with the stress of our daily lives. The popular interest in meditation and its health benefits may help drive more research in the future.
