Surge Reported in Health Emergencies Tied to Cocaine

In an indication of cocaine’s growing toll on American users, hospitals across the country reported a sharp surge in cocaine-induced health emergencies in the last year, the government said Monday.

Emergency room cases linked to cocaine reached unprecedented levels in 15 major cities, with only one city showing a decline, the survey said. At the same time, the number of cocaine-related deaths increased in nearly every city studied.

Although the survey by the National Institute on Drug Abuse also recorded increased numbers of heroin- and marijuana-related health emergencies, the government said the results leave no doubt that cocaine remains “the most noteworthy drug” of national concern.

In a bipartisan statement, ranking members of a congressional panel on drug abuse blamed the trend on the increasing popularity of “crack” and other smokable forms of cocaine, which allow the drug to be ingested in highly concentrated form.

“People need to know that crack and other cocaine forms maim and kill,” said Reps. Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.) and Lawrence Coughlin (R-Pa.) in a joint statement on behalf of the House Select Narcotics Abuse and Control Committee.

A spokesman for William J. Bennett, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, described the survey as a vital “barometer” of the nation’s drug problem. “This is a good measure of just how bad it is,” said the spokesman, Larry Cirigiano.

The drug abuse institute has been conducting the semiannual survey for three years. Based on information collected through December, this installment provided the government’s most up-to-date portrayal of national trends in drug abuse.

The data showed that drug-related health emergencies continue to accelerate even after the previous years’ steady climb.

Los Angeles was among the cities showing an increase in cocaine-related health crises, with nearly 2,000 such emergency room admissions in 1988. The figure represented a 33% increase over the same period in 1987.

The pace of cocaine-caused deaths in Los Angeles remained virtually unchanged from the previous year’s total of 360, the report showed.

The surge elsewhere was far steeper, with a 134% increase in cocaine-related emergency room admissions in Washington, a 199% hike in Philadelphia and a 210% leap in New Orleans.

Other cities in which cocaine-related hospital emergencies leaped by more than 50% in 1988 from the previous year included Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Detroit, Phoenix, St. Louis, Seattle, Dallas/San Antonio and Newark, N.J. Only Miami reported a decline, with cocaine a factor in 17% fewer hospital emergencies than the previous year.

Ten of the 19 cities surveyed showed an increase in heroin emergency room cases, with New Orleans alone reporting a 300% increase. The report, however, cautioned that a change in reporting criterion for heroin might have been partly responsible for the surge.

Heroin-related deaths increased in the Northeast, the report said, but declined or remained stable in the West.

As for marijuana, 16 of the 19 cities reported increases in emergency room cases, with seven cities showing increases of more than 100%.

Research data indicated that episodes “involving marijuana in combination with one or more other drugs” had been principally responsible for the sharp increase in emergency cases, the report said. Emergencies involving marijuana alone also increased, but at a significantly slower rate.