COCAINE OVERTAKING HEROIN AS TOP KILLER

Cocaine is B.C.'s new killer drug.

Deaths from cocaine use this year are set to reach 200, according to
Dr. Stuart Huckin of the Provincial Toxicology Centre.

For the first time, cocaine deaths will exceed heroin deaths.

"This year, cocaine will become the leading cause of death among
illicit drugs," Huckin said yesterday.

Dr. John Blatherwick, chief medical officer for the Vancouver Coastal
Health Authority, confirmed that over the past five years the number
of cocaine-related deaths has come close to exceeding the number of
heroin-related deaths which peaked around 1993-94.

"We've been seeing cocaine [use] take over from heroin for almost
five years -- there is no question it is the predominant drug,"
Blatherwick told The Province last night.

"I'm surprised it's been this long to get the death toll to overtake
it as well."

But Blatherwick noted many drug deaths are not straightforward. He
said drug cocktails washed down by alcohol are often the killers.

"There are very few pure deaths. Almost every death is a mixture of
drugs and, in the vast majority, alcohol plays a role," said
Blatherwick. "The drug overcomes the respiratory system and usually
it is the alcohol on top of that that sedates them enough that they
just can't kick out of it.

"They just put the person into a slow [comatose state] and friends
don't recognize -- particularly when combined with alcohol -- that
the person has stopped breathing."

Blatherwick added many people who overdose on heroin are
resuscitated, while it's not easy to revive coke overdoses.

"The thing with a heroin overdose is we have Narcan," Blatherwick
said of the drug that restarts hearts. "We can usually resuscitate
people, but with a cocaine overdose there isn't a lot we can do."