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THE PARICIPANTS

AGE AT FIRST USE

The following statistics look at the age at which defendants commenced their illicit drug use. They are calculated on the basis of 469 Queensland Health assessments conducted out of the 555 people referred to the Drug Court26.

Age at first use—Amphetamine

QH data shows that 431 (92%) out of the 469 assessed by QH said they had used amphetamines at some time and 196 (45.5% of all amphetamine users) listed amphetamines as their primary drug of choice and a further 70 out of the amphetamine users were listed as poly-drug users, often making their treatment more complex.

The chart below examines the self disclosed age of first use of amphetamines.

The chart shows a very disturbing trend toward use of amphetamines at younger ages.

The youngest was aged 11 and the oldest 45 at first use. Indeed, by age 16, the peak age for first use, a total of 178 (41.3% of all amphetamine users) had commenced amphetamine use.

By age 17 more than half of all amphetamine users (224 or 52%) had commenced amphetamine use. QH Drug Court data also shows that of the 196 who classed amphetamines as their primary drug of choice, only 61 (31%) had attempted any prior treatment before being referred to the Drug Court27. The longest period of amphetamine use among Drug Court participants had been for 24 years.

26 No assessments were conducted for the remaining 86 mostly because they changed their minds about seeking a Drug Court order following legal advice and were remitted to the arrest court, usually for committal proceedings to proceed.

27 This fact is even more disturbing when taken together with the fact, according to Wodak and Moore, only one in three Australian drug users seeking treatment is able to enter treatment owing to a lack of resources. See A Wodak and T Moore, Modernising Australia’s Drug Policy, UNSW Press, p 66 (2002).

Amphetamine - Age of First Use

Queensland Health data also shows that 291 (62%) out of the 469 assessed by QH said they had used heroin at some time and 157 (54% of all heroin users) listed heroin as their primary drug of choice and a further 56 out of the heroin users were listed as poly-drug users, making their treatment more complex.

The chart below examines the self disclosed age of first use of heroin among the 555 people referred to the Drug Court for assessment. The chart, again, shows a very disturbing trend toward use of heroin at younger ages.

The youngest was aged 12 and the oldest 39 at first use. Indeed, by age 17, the peak age for first use, a total of 129 (44.3% of all heroin users) had commenced heroin use.

By age 18 more than half of all heroin users (156 or 53.6%) had commenced heroin use. QH Drug Court data also shows that of the 157 who classed heroin as their primary drug of choice, 122 (77.7%) had attempted prior treatment (mainly due to the Methadone maintenance program) before being referred to the Drug Court. The longest period of heroin use among Drug Court participants had been for 30 years.

The statistics above do not take into account 64 people who had abused morphine, pethidine and other opiates.

Heroin - Age of First Use

6 8

24 27

23

8 15

11 11

12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 33 39

21

33 37

18 17

9

7 7

1 2

3 2 1 Numbers at each age

Age at first use—Cannabis

The pilot program magistrate can say with confidence, having read more than 400 health assessments and accompanying pre-sentence reports, many drug users had commenced using cannabis before moving on to amphetamines, heroin or other drugs of abuse. Also, many commenced at about the same time as smoking tobacco or drinking excessive quantities of alcohol (often amounting to binge drinking).

Queensland Health data also shows that 370 (78.9%) out of the 469 assessed by QH said they had used cannabis at some time and only 13 (3.5% of all cannabis users) listed cannabis as their primary drug of choice and 125 (26.7%) as their secondary drug of choice. A further 62 out of the cannabis users were listed as poly-drug users.

The chart below examines the self disclosed age of first use of cannabis. It is by now cliché to say the chart shows a very disturbing trend toward use of cannabis at younger ages.

Out of the 370 cannabis users, 14 could not recall their age of first use. Of the 356 remaining, and shown in the chart below, the youngest recorded was aged 7 and the oldest 29 at first use. By the mere age of 13, the peak age for first use, a total of 150 (40.5% of all cannabis users) had commenced cannabis use.

By age 14 more than half of all cannabis users (215 or 58%) had commenced cannabis use. Only 31 (8.4%) had tried prior treatment for cannabis abuse.

The longest period of cannabis use among Drug Court participants had been for 29 years.

Cannabis - Age of First Use

Only 30 of the 469 had tried cocaine. None listed it as a primary drug of choice while 6 were ploy drug users and 3 listed cocaine as a secondary drug of choice.

Benzodiazepines

Thirty-one people out of 55 who had abused benzodiazepines were listed as either poly-drug users or as secondary choice users.

CONCLUSION Clearly, preventative measures such as drug education programs and legal sanctions were not enough to deter these individuals.

Preventative programs will need to be better targeted to younger age groups.

The issue is not whether drug education is needed. It is a question of having age appropriate information and an effective delivery method.

There also needs to be a greater focus on early intervention and counselling for causally related factors such as child sexual abuse, other physical and verbal abuse and the absence of a significant adult in the formative years.

The nurturing and development of life skills at a young age is also imperative. If the causes of drug abuse are left unchecked, it usually takes many years of personal suffering from drug abuse, and of consequential social harm, before treatment is even attempted for the first time. In the meantime, as one insightful Drug Court community corrections officer reflected, these people “miss out on the lessons many Australians are fortunate to have learned by their mother’s knee”.

However, not all families are functional and nurturing. What hope is there for some youths when, as we have seen frequently in the Drug Court, they are introduced to drugs by a mother, father or sibling? These are the very people they trust to provide comfort, shelter, love and direction. Many Australians believe

their home is a castle, a family safe haven to return to when life bears down on them. Where does a young girl go when she is repeatedly witness to, or victim of, domestic violence or sexual abuse perpetrated within the family (where most sexual abuse in fact occurs)? Their homes are not safe places.