NATIONAL INSTITUTE ON DRUG ABUSE EPIDEMIOLOGIC ...

monly mentioned secondary drug among persons
treated for primary heroin-related problems. In FY
2003, African-Americans remained the largest proportion
of total persons treated (62 percent) for cocaine
abuse. Males accounted for more services rendered
(58 percent) than females. Smoking continued
to be the most common route of cocaine administration
(85 percent) in FY 2003.
According to the 2003 ADAM report, 51 percent of
adult male arrestees (exhibit 3) and 33 percent of
adult female arrestees tested cocaine positive.
Cocaine use appears common among heroin users in
Chicago. In an ongoing study of non-injecting heroin
users (NIHU Study), 70 percent of participants reported
ever using powder cocaine, and 35 percent
used it in the past 6 months. Crack cocaine use was
reported by 68 percent of the study participants, and
53 percent reported using crack in the past 6 months.
Among injecting drug users (Family Process study),
86 percent reported ever using powder cocaine, and
51 percent used it in the past 12 months. Somewhat
fewer participants had ever used crack cocaine (76
percent), but 58 percent reported using it in the past
12 months.
According to IDPH’s Adverse Pregnancy Outcome
Reporting System, cocaine exposure among children
at birth in Chicago has been decreasing since 1999.
In 2002, 354 children were exposed to cocaine at
birth, which corresponds to a rate of 73.8 per 10,000
live births in Chicago, a 29-percent decrease from
1999. Although steadily decreasing, cocaine continues
to be the most often cited drug exposure among
children in Chicago. The highest proportion of such
births occurred among African-American mothers
(approximately 78 percent) and to mothers between
25 and 34 years of age.
State (ISP) and Federal (NFLIS) labs reported that
cocaine was the drug most often received for testing
after cannabis. Cocaine purity for samples weighing 2–
25 grams tested by the ISP was 81 percent in 2003 and
77 percent in 2004, but analyses were conducted on
only a few samples, and reasonable comparison with
earlier data is not possible.
Cocaine prices have not changed since the June 2003
report. Ounce prices for powder cocaine were reported
by street sources to be between $400 and $800, depending
on the drug’s quality and the buyer’s relationship
to the seller. Gram prices for powder and rock
cocaine ranged from $50 to $150, with most reports
around $75. Ounces of crack cocaine (“rock”) sold for
about the same price as ounces of powder cocaine,
with reports ranging from $900 to $1,600. The NDIC
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EPIDEMIOLOGIC TRENDS IN DRUG ABUSE—Chicago
reported the wholesale price of a kilogram of cocaine
in Chicago was $18,000–$20,000 for powdered cocaine
and $22,000–$24,000 for crack. The June 2003
report contains more detailed information about drug
prices in Chicago.
According to the 2003 YRBSS study, the proportion of
lifetime cocaine/crack use among Chicago-area 9th
through 12th grade students remained level at about 5
percent between 1995 and 2003. Male students reported
cocaine/crack use nearly twice as often as their
female counterparts during this period. The 2002 Illinois
Youth Survey of Chicago-area 8th through 12th
grade students reported a similar level of use (about 5
percent) between 1998 and 2002. The June 2004 Chicago
CEWG report provides a more complete discussion
of the 2002 Illinois Youth Survey.
Heroin
Heroin abuse indicators in this reporting period reveal
that heroin continues to be a significant problem
in Chicago.
Of the 711 total drug-induced or drug-related deaths
reported by the DAWN ME for Cook County in
2002, 48 percent (339) had a mention of heroin/ morphine.
After reporting 1 death per year in 2000 and
2001 caused by accidental heroin exposure, CDPH
reported 18 deaths in 2002.
The rate of heroin ED mentions in Chicago increased
significantly from 83 per 100,000 population in 1995
to 220 in 2002 (exhibit 1), an increase of 167 percent.
This rate was the highest in the contiguous United
States. Preliminary unweighted DAWN Live! ED
data for 2003 and 2004 indicate that heroin is the
second most frequently reported drug, following only
cocaine. In the DAWN Live! 2004 data, the majority
of heroin ED reports involved males (63 percent),
African-Americans (52 percent), and those between
35 and 54 years old (58 percent).
The number of persons treated for heroin use in
State-supported programs in FY 2003 was 34,615, an
increase of 58 percent from FY 2002 (exhibit 2).
Seventy percent of the total heroin treatment episodes
reported in FY 2003 occurred in Chicago alone, supporting
other indicators of high heroin use in the city.
The proportion of persons treated for heroin use who
reported intranasal “snorting” as their primary route
of administration remained high at 73 percent in FY
2003. Pronounced differences exist between African-
Americans, Hispanics, and Whites treated for heroin
use in 2003 in the primary route of heroin administration.
In FY 2003, injection was the primary means for
administering heroin for 10 percent of African-
Proceedings of the Community Epidemiology Work Group, Vol. II, January 2005