NATIONAL INSTITUTE ON DRUG ABUSE EPIDEMIOLOGIC ...

in their midst, especially crystal methamphetamine,
and the apparent lack of success in State prevention
and treatment efforts.
Data Sources
Much of the data presented in this report are from the
Honolulu CEWG, which met on January 14, 2005.
The meeting was hosted by the Hawai'i High Intensity
Drug Trafficking Area program office, whose
staff facilitated the attendance of the Drug Enforcement
Administration representatives, as well as persons
knowledgeable about drug data from Honolulu
and neighbor islands. The State of Hawai'i Narcotics
Enforcement Division, although invited, did not participate
in the CEWG meeting. Several neighbor island
police departments, as well as the Honolulu Police
Department, submitted data, but they were not
able to attend the CEWG meeting because of deployment
commitments at the State level. Neighbor
island data, however, remain inconsistent and are not
reported in this report, since problems with the respective
narcotics-vice information systems have not
been resolved. For these reasons, this report is focused
primarily on drug activities in O'ahu for the
calendar year 2004, with the exception of State
treatment data, which were available for only the first
6 months of 2004. Other specific data sources are
listed below:
• Treatment admissions and demographic data
were provided by the Hawai’i State Department
of Health, Alcohol and Drug Abuse Division
(ADAD). Previous data from ADAD are updated
for this report whenever ADAD reviews its records.
These data represent all State-supported
treatment facilities (90 percent of all facilities).
About 5–10 percent of these programs and two
large private treatment facilities do not provide
data. During this reporting period, approximately
45 percent of the treatment admissions were paid
for by ADAD; the remainder was covered by
State health insurance agencies or by private insurance.
The rate of uninsurance for the State is
about 10 percent.
• Drug-related death data were provided by the
Honolulu City and County Medical Examiner
(ME) Office. These data are based on toxicology
screens performed by the ME Office on bodies
brought to them for examination. The sorts of
circumstances that would lead to the body being
examined by the ME include unattended deaths,
deaths by suspicious cause, and clear drugrelated
deaths. In short, while the ME data are
consistent, they are not comprehensive and ac-
EPIDEMIOLOGIC TRENDS IN DRUG ABUSE—Honolulu, Hawai'i
count for only about one-third of all deaths on
O’ahu. To allow a direct comparison between
ME data and treatment data, the ME data on the
exhibits have been multiplied by 10.
• Law enforcement case data for 2004 were received
from the Honolulu Police Department,
Narcotics/Vice Division only. Data for 2003 and
earlier were received from the Kona Police Department.
• Arrestee drug testing data were provided by
the Arrestee Drug Abuse Monitoring (ADAM)
program of the National Institute of Justice
(NIJ). The ADAM program has reported its data
regularly to the CEWG, but NIJ closed the
ADAM program effective December 2003. Thus,
the current data are all that will exist for this sentinel
data source. The ADAM project collected
its data at the Central Receiving Unit of the
Honolulu Police Department. Data on the urine
testing component, as well as the questionnaire
findings, were presented. This will be the last report
to include these final data.
• Drug price data were provided by the Honolulu
Police Department (HPD), Narcotics/Vice Division,
for 2003.
• Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) data were accessed
from the State’s Attorney General’s Web
site for 1975–2003.
Emergency department (ED) drug mentions data
have not been available in Hawai'i since 1994. Discussions
with the Healthcare Association of Hawai'i
regarding inclusion in the Drug Abuse Warning Network
(DAWN) program have resulted in a briefing of
all hospital CEOs and the sharing of DAWN information.
Given the added burden of the cost of care of
ice users and the general concern expressed at the
community level, it is hoped that a meeting can be
arranged between the DAWN program and the association
during the coming months.
DRUG ABUSE PATTERNS AND TRENDS
Hawaiians and Whites remain the majority user groups
among the 17 identified ethnic groups (plus 2 other
categories: "other" and "unknown/blank") who access
ADAD facilities for substance abuse treatment. During
the first half of 2004, 47.7 percent and 19.9 percent of
the admissions were Hawaiians/Part Hawaiians or
Whites, respectively. All other groups represented
significantly lower proportions of admissions.
Proceedings of the Community Epidemiology Work Group, Vol. II, January 2005 85