Heroin still most abused drug, says report

The State's largest drug treatment centre has confirmed heroin remains the most abused among its clients.

The Dublin-based Drug Treatment Centre Board (DTCB) said today on the publication of its annual report for 2001 that client visits to its services had increased by over 18 per cent on last year.

The annual report showed that the DTCB treated 1,189 people in 2001. Of those, 1,069 presented following heroin misuse, 44 for non-medically prescribed use of methadone and 19 for abusing benzodiazepines.

Ms Sheila Heffernan, DTCB general manager, said: "In 2001 there were 96,543 client visits to Trinity Court [where the centre is located] representing an increase of 14,893 on 2000". She said 111 under 19-year-olds received treatment from the DTCB last year.

Ms Heffernan said specialised training was to be introduced to cope with an increased demand for testing from schools and employers.

The DTCB carried out 175,700 urine samples last year, up 10 per cent from the previous year. Among the trends observed from these tests is that the number of positive opiate samples rose by 20 per cent on 2000 and confirmations of cocaine samples rose by 46 per cent over the same period.