Changing trends in heroin abuse in India: an assessment based on treatment records

The study of drug addicts who were treated in the drug-abuse facilities of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences during the period from 1981 to May 1984 indicates a steady increase in the number of heroin addicts who sought treatment in those facilities. The majority of heroin addicts were under 30 years of age (87.6 per cent), unmarried (67.6 per cent), had reached either high school or college (80.0 per cent) and reported having taken up to one gram per day (56.6 per cent) of the drug for one year or less (63.8 per cent). Heroin was mainly smoked (74.3 per cent) and in some cases inhaled, sniffed or injected. Up to 1981 there were no heroin addicts recorded in the treatment facilities. Other studies in India support this evidence. On the basis of the recency of heroin addiction in India, and its trend and development in other countries of the region, the authors predict a rapid increase in heroin addiction and in the manufacture of heroin in the country.