- Authorities are moving to ban pipes used to smoke a drug
endangering affluent Australian teenagers.
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- The spread of ice, a powerful amphetamine that is smoked,
and which can turn users into violent psychopaths, has sparked moves to
ban the sale of the pipes.
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- A Herald Sun investigation found more than 10,000 of
the purpose-built "crack" pipes, costing up to $50 each, are
legally sold in Victoria alone every month.
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- Drug rehabilitation experts say a fifth of all people
in their 20s have taken the drug, and add it is "the rich kids"
who are driving the new phenomenon.
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- Teenagers from affluent families are signing up for treatment,
often displaying psychotic and violent behaviour - even physically attacking
counsellors.
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- Major shopping centres have the pipes on display in full
view of window shoppers and children.
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- A crack pipe supplier told the Herald Sun at the peak
of the ice craze he was selling 10,000 pipes a month through shops across
Victoria.
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- "We can produce them for 50 cents and they are moving
way faster than bongs," the supplier said.
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- The Herald Sun found individual smoking paraphernalia
shops were selling up to 50 pipes a week.
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- Victoria's Consumer Affairs Minister, John Lenders, confirmed
the State Government was investigating ways to remove the pipes from sale.
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- CAV had responded to police concerns about the availability
of the pipes, he said.
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- Selling for $40 a hit, ice can lead to paranoid delusions,
psychotic episodes and violence.
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- Users often stay awake for days. More than 500,000 Australians
have used ice, a Turning Point drug clinic doctor said.
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- Raymond Hader drug clinic director Richard Smith said
smoking ice was causing some rich kids to turn violent.
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- "When things fall apart they are protected (financially)
but they still end up becoming psychotic and coming to me," he said.
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- "It is the rich kids, the Toorak kids. It is becoming
very big in the clubbing scene. There has been an increase in violence
and violent crime because they are getting into ice."
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- Mr Smith said in 18 years counselling drug addicts he
had never been attacked until ice hit Melbourne.
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- "In the last two years I have had four extremely
violent incidents where I have had my life threatened. It is all due to
people on ice," he said.
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- National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre spokesman Paul
Dillon said ice use was experiencing a rapid rise.
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- "We hadn't really seen it before a couple of years
ago," Mr Dillon said.
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- "Now it is the second most popular drug behind cannabis,"
he said.
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- Ice is a powerful form of the amphetamine speed converted
into crystal for smoking. Speed usually has a purity from 5-15 per cent
but ice is more than 75 per cent pure.
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- Law enforcement, health and forensic communities as well
as drug counsellors told the Herald Sun they were feeling the impact of
the surge in ice users.
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- Department of Human Services figures show the number
of people seeking treatment for amphetamine addiction has more than doubled
in three years.
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- An Australian Federal Police report found the largest
amounts of ice seized on Australia's borders came in the first half of
last year.
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- Customs seized more than 233kg of ice in the 2002-03
financial year.
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- South-East Asia was the source of 98.5 per cent of seizures
and the average weight of a seizure was increasing.
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- Copyright 2003 News Limited.
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- http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,8369126%255E28097,00.html
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