CRACK'S IN THE SYSTEM

Edmonton High Schools Overrun: Expert

Crack - once a poor man's drug linked to U.S.  slums and drughouse babies - has overrun Edmonton with one expert charging school kids are smoking the drug every day.

Dr.  Louis Pagliaro, associate director of the University of Alberta's substance abusology research unit, has been in the game 30 years and was the RCMP's key expert witness during a landmark crack trial in 1995.

"You would be hard pressed to find a high school in Edmonton right now where crack wasn't being used every day," Pagliaro said.  "Crack use is near epidemic proportions."

He says crack users smoke the drug in a pipe.  "One in 10 ( users ) will be addicted after their first puff."

George Nicholson, who chairs the public school board, concedes things may be as bad as Pagliaro says.  He plans to ask for a report into crack use in schools.

"When I was a principal seven years ago we knew of pot and hash being smoked at school.  But crack, that's not a progression we want to see.

"I hope Dr.  Pagliaro is not right, but he may indeed be."

The crisis has not gone unnoticed by cops or drug agencies.

RCMP drug squad boss Staff Sgt.  Doug Carruthers said crack hit Edmonton streets in the early 1990s.

"Ten years ago we didn't have crack on the streets.  You rarely saw it.  Now what we've got is use of other drugs dwindling and crack use is soaring," Carruthers said.

"People are buying cocaine just to turn it into crack."

Cocaine is heated and mixed with baking soda to become crack.  The white rocks are then smoked and the high is quick and more intense than coke.

It's also more addictive because users can smoke greater quantities than a coke addict can snort.

The Alberta Alcohol and Drug Abuse Commission doesn't differentiate between crack and coke use.  But figures show the number of Alberta coke addicts almost doubled in the past four years.  It jumped to 4,087 last year from 2,219 in 1996.

And that's just the tip of the iceberg.

Keith Hughes, a consultant for AADAC's cocaine addiction clinic in Grande Prairie, says there are dozens of Albertan addicts who aren't treated for every one who is.

"Maybe they aren't at the end of their rope yet or won't admit the problem," Hughes said.

"But there's no doubt we're seeing an increase in coke addiction."

Carruthers said Alberta RCMP made a huge cocaine linked bust in Edmonton last September and charged 35 people.  "They won't go to trial until next November ( but ) as soon as you take people out of the system, there is always someone there to replace them."