British Opiate Users: I. People Approaching London Drug Treatment Centres

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Abstract
Summary Interviews were secured with over 90% of a sample of 230 people, all of whom had fixed drugs, had approached any outpatient drug treatment center in Greater London during the 1-year period commencing mid-November 1970, and had no significant previous clinic contact. Results include descriptions of family and demographic background, current life styles, illegal activities, initial and current drug use, periods of abstention, and physical complications. Males constituted 80% of the sample. Most of the respondents were between 18 and 25 years of age. About half of the respondents held full-time employment at the time of interview. About 25 % of the sample had been convicted of at least one nondrug offense in the previous year, but the majority of these respondents also had had at least one conviction prior to their first fix. Eleven percent of respondents report having been “planted” in the 12-month period prior to interview. Most respondents had at least tried a wide variety of drugs, including the injection of sedatives and of Chinese heroin. From the time of first fix of heroin or methadone, there was a median interval of about 1 year before respondents “first fixed daily for 7 days,“ and a further interval of about 2 years before approaching a drug clinic—but this is subject to considerable variability. On average about half of respondents’ acquaintances who had fixed also have come to clinics. The main reason given as to why the remainder did not do so was simply that they did not use enough opiates to warrant it.

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