Jabberwocky
Frumious Bandersnatch
- Joined
- Nov 3, 1999
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- 84,998
While the ice epidemic has been making headlines across Australia, another hard drug is making a terrifying comeback.
An A Current Affair investigation has uncovered broad daylight drug deals on Russell Street - one of central Melbourne's busy shopping strips.
On Sunday night, police raided the area, along with several other locations across the city, due to growing concerns about the resurgence of heroin across Melbourne.
During Sunday's raids, police arrested an alleged drug king pin, along with five other people.
Staff at Sydney's supervised injecting room at Kings Cross have seen a 60 percent increase in the number of people using heroin in the past six months.
Family Drug Support Australia have reported the number of phone calls relating to heroin doubled in the past year.
"It's not just Sydney and Melbourne, it seems to be across the board. Western Australia, even some of the regional areas, are seeing an increase in heroin use," Family Drug Support Australia CEO Tony Trimingham said.
For Mr Trimingham, his attempts to get help for people in the grips of heroin addiction come from his own experience losing a loved one at the hands of heroin.
His son, Damian, was a school prefect and excelled at sport.
After a year-long battle with the drug, he died of a heroin overdose at 22.
"Anybody that loses a child knows how terrible it is, and how it never leaves you," Mr Trimingham said.
"When you lose them to drugs, with all the stigma and shame and community attitude, it is far worse because you can't really talk about it to people."
With the resurgence of heroin, calls for more safe injecting rooms across the country are growing.
Leading criminal barrister Robert Richter QC believes the rooms do not send the wrong message on drug use, in fact - he believes they have the opposite effect.
"There are times in an addicts life where they want to give up, and they need to have immediate access to proper counselling, proper referrals, and proper assistance - that they don't get on the streets," Mr Richter said.
Mr Richter is leading the calls for a safe injecting room in Melbourne.
"In Melbourne we definitely need one. It's not going to encourage people to take drugs, it's going to make it safer for people that do and it's also going to mean there aren't people down in your front yards shooting up or down laneways," he said.
"It just give people a safe medically supported place to do that and if they're going to do it anyway it may as well be in a safe place."
Read more at http://www.9news.com.au/national/20...s-ice-takes-the-spotlight#z1scPXkWkVmzemMg.99
An A Current Affair investigation has uncovered broad daylight drug deals on Russell Street - one of central Melbourne's busy shopping strips.
On Sunday night, police raided the area, along with several other locations across the city, due to growing concerns about the resurgence of heroin across Melbourne.
During Sunday's raids, police arrested an alleged drug king pin, along with five other people.
Staff at Sydney's supervised injecting room at Kings Cross have seen a 60 percent increase in the number of people using heroin in the past six months.
Family Drug Support Australia have reported the number of phone calls relating to heroin doubled in the past year.
"It's not just Sydney and Melbourne, it seems to be across the board. Western Australia, even some of the regional areas, are seeing an increase in heroin use," Family Drug Support Australia CEO Tony Trimingham said.
For Mr Trimingham, his attempts to get help for people in the grips of heroin addiction come from his own experience losing a loved one at the hands of heroin.
His son, Damian, was a school prefect and excelled at sport.
After a year-long battle with the drug, he died of a heroin overdose at 22.
"Anybody that loses a child knows how terrible it is, and how it never leaves you," Mr Trimingham said.
"When you lose them to drugs, with all the stigma and shame and community attitude, it is far worse because you can't really talk about it to people."
With the resurgence of heroin, calls for more safe injecting rooms across the country are growing.
Leading criminal barrister Robert Richter QC believes the rooms do not send the wrong message on drug use, in fact - he believes they have the opposite effect.
"There are times in an addicts life where they want to give up, and they need to have immediate access to proper counselling, proper referrals, and proper assistance - that they don't get on the streets," Mr Richter said.
Mr Richter is leading the calls for a safe injecting room in Melbourne.
"In Melbourne we definitely need one. It's not going to encourage people to take drugs, it's going to make it safer for people that do and it's also going to mean there aren't people down in your front yards shooting up or down laneways," he said.
"It just give people a safe medically supported place to do that and if they're going to do it anyway it may as well be in a safe place."
Read more at http://www.9news.com.au/national/20...s-ice-takes-the-spotlight#z1scPXkWkVmzemMg.99
