by Aaron Atkinson on September 18, 2009
Scientists have found traces of cocaine in 95% of banknotes collected in Washington, the American Chemical Society reports, and 90% from large cities such as Baltimore, Boston and Detroit.
The lowest average was found on bills collected from Salt Lake City.
The findings were presented at the 238th National Meeting of the ACS, which says the study suggests ”cocaine abuse is still widespread and may be on the rise in some areas.”
The scientists, led by Yuegang Zuo of the University of Massachusetts in Dartmouth, tested banknotes from more than 30 cities in five countries, including the USA, Canada, Brazil, China and Japan, and found “alarming” evidence of cocaine use in many areas.
The USA and Canada had the highest levels while China and Japan had the lowest, 12%-20% contamination.
Zuo says the U.S. figures represent a 20% jump over a similar study two years ago.
Bills can become contaminated during drug deals and directly through drug use such as snorting cocaine through rolled bills, the ACS notes. It is then spread as banknotes are run through currency-counting machines.
Zuo says the amounts involved present no health risk and are “unlikely to interfere with blood and urine tests used for drug detection.”
Source: USA Today
by Aaron Atkinson on September 8, 2009
Many baby boomers (Americans in the generation born between 1946 and 1964) are continuing to use illicit drugs as they grow older, causing the rate of illicit drug use to go up within the 50 to 59 year old age segment of the population. According to a new analytical publication produced by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), those aged 50 to 59 reporting use of illicit drugs within the past year has nearly doubled from 5.1 percent in 2002 to 9.4 percent in 2007 while rates among all other age groups are statistically staying the same or decreasing.
An Examination of Trends in Illicit Drug Use among Adults Aged 50 to 59 in the United States is the first in a series of new scientific reports being published periodically by SAMHSA’s Office of Applied Studies that will provided detailed analyses on important substance abuse and mental health issues challenging the nation.
“These findings show that many in the Woodstock generation continue to use illicit drugs as they age,” said SAMHSA Acting Administrator Eric Broderick, D.D.S., M.P.H. “This continued use poses medical risks to these individuals and is likely to put further strains on the nation’s health care system — highlighting the value of preventing drug use from ever starting.”
The report analyzes many aspects of this phenomenon including the types of illicit substances involved, different demographic and behavioral factors associated with higher rates of use, and other issues. The data used in the analysis comes from a wide range of sources including 16,656 respondents aged 50 to 59 participating in the 2002 through 2007 National Surveys on Drug Use and Health – the nation’s premier national public health survey of its kind.
The full report is available on the web at http://oas.samhsa.gov/. For related publications and information, visit http://www.samhsa.gov/ .