PMID- 21388761
OWN - NLM
STAT- MEDLINE
DCOM- 20111103
LR  - 20131121
IS  - 1872-6283 (Electronic)
IS  - 0379-0738 (Linking)
VI  - 210
IP  - 1-3
DP  - 2011 Jul 15
TI  - Population drug use in Australia: a wastewater analysis.
PG  - 69-73
LID - 10.1016/j.forsciint.2011.01.037 [doi]
AB  - Accurate information on drug use in communities is essential if health, social 
      and economic harms associated with illicit drug use are to be addressed 
      efficiently. In most countries population drug use is estimated indirectly via 
      surveys, medical presentations and police and custom seizures. All of these 
      methods have at least some problems due to bias, small samples and/or long time 
      delays between collecting the information and analysing the results. Recently the 
      direct quantification of drug residues in wastewater has shown promise as a means 
      of monitoring drug use in defined geographical areas. In this study we measured 
      3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), methamphetamine and benzoylecgonine in 
      sewage inflows in metropolitan and regional areas of Australia and compared these 
      data with published European data. Cocaine use was small compared to European 
      cities (p<0.001) but was compensated for by much greater consumption of 
      methamphetamine (p<0.001) and MDMA (p<0.05). MDMA was more popular in regional 
      areas (p<0.05) whereas methamphetamine and cocaine were mainly consumed in the 
      city (p<0.05). Greater than 5-fold increases in MDMA use were detected on 
      weekends (p<0.001). This approach has the potential to improve our understanding 
      of drug use in populations and should be further developed to improve prevention 
      and treatment programs.
CI  - Copyright (c) 2011 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.
FAU - Irvine, Rodney J
AU  - Irvine RJ
AD  - Discipline of Pharmacology, School of Medical Sciences, University of Adelaide, 
      Adelaide, SA 5005, Australia.
FAU - Kostakis, Chris
AU  - Kostakis C
FAU - Felgate, Peter D
AU  - Felgate PD
FAU - Jaehne, Emily J
AU  - Jaehne EJ
FAU - Chen, Chang
AU  - Chen C
FAU - White, Jason M
AU  - White JM
LA  - eng
PT  - Journal Article
PT  - Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
DEP - 20110309
PL  - Ireland
TA  - Forensic Sci Int
JT  - Forensic science international
JID - 7902034
RN  - 0 (Narcotics)
RN  - 0 (Sewage)
RN  - 44RAL3456C (Methamphetamine)
RN  - 5353I8I6YS (benzoylecgonine)
RN  - I5Y540LHVR (Cocaine)
RN  - KE1SEN21RM (N-Methyl-3,4-methylenedioxyamphetamine)
SB  - IM
MH  - Australia/epidemiology
MH  - Cocaine/analogs & derivatives/analysis
MH  - Humans
MH  - Methamphetamine/analysis
MH  - N-Methyl-3,4-methylenedioxyamphetamine/analysis
MH  - Narcotics/*analysis
MH  - Sewage/*chemistry
MH  - Substance-Related Disorders/*epidemiology
MH  - Suburban Population
MH  - Time Factors
MH  - Urban Population
EDAT- 2011/03/11 06:00
MHDA- 2011/11/04 06:00
CRDT- 2011/03/11 06:00
PHST- 2010/11/21 00:00 [received]
PHST- 2011/01/15 00:00 [revised]
PHST- 2011/01/30 00:00 [accepted]
PHST- 2011/03/11 06:00 [entrez]
PHST- 2011/03/11 06:00 [pubmed]
PHST- 2011/11/04 06:00 [medline]
AID - S0379-0738(11)00052-1 [pii]
AID - 10.1016/j.forsciint.2011.01.037 [doi]
PST - ppublish
SO  - Forensic Sci Int. 2011 Jul 15;210(1-3):69-73. doi: 
      10.1016/j.forsciint.2011.01.037. Epub 2011 Mar 9.