[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 13]
[House]
[Pages 18585-18589]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]


[[Page 18585]]

                      ILLEGAL NARCOTICS IN AMERICA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Simpson). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 6, 1999, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Mica) is 
recognized for 60 minutes.
  Mr. MICA. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to come before the House again 
tonight to talk about the issue of illegal narcotics and its impact 
upon our society.
  Tonight I am going to focus on a topic that I have discussed usually 
on Tuesday nights in the past before my colleagues and the American 
public, and that is the specific impact of illegal narcotics on our 
communities and on our population.
  Tonight I will bring up again the chart that I did before, the little 
poster that I have had here on the floor before. And it, basically, 
says that drugs destroy lives, a large poster background. I think this 
background is fitting tonight to bring out again. It is a rather large 
poster. It talks about a rather large problem: drugs destroy lives.
  It is a simple message, simple poster. I have had it on the floor 
before. We have used it in my district to demonstrate that illegal 
narcotics are, in fact, wreaking havoc upon young people's lives and 
also all Americans' lives.
  Tonight I want to specifically release some data that was given to 
our Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy, and Human Resources 
today, and that is a startling announcement and a startling revelation 
that, for the first time in the history of the United States of 
America, the drug-induced deaths exceed homicides across our land.
  These are the figures that we have. Some 16,926 Americans lost their 
lives to drug-induced deaths in 1998. Murders in that year were 16,914, 
an incredible milestone in a problem that we are experiencing across 
the land from the East Coast to the West Coast to the Canadian border 
down to the Mexican border. And for the first time, again in the 
statistical compilation of the United States, drug-induced deaths 
exceed murders.
  It is a sad milestone but, again, one reflected in so many 
communities affecting so many families and destroying so many lives.
  This is indeed a sad turn of events for our Nation. And it is sad, 
too, that the administration under which this has occurred, the 
Clinton/Gore administration, has not paid attention to this problem and 
has tried to sweep the problem aside.
  What really disturbs me as Chair of the Subcommittee on Criminal 
Justice, Drug Policy, and Human Resources is the attempt in the last 
few weeks since I guess we are getting close to election to try to put 
a happy, smiling face on the problem of drug abuse and illegal 
narcotics misuse in this country.
  There have been some staged events with the Secretary of HHS and 
other drug officials of this administration to try to come up with 
anything that puts a happy face on the problem that we face with 
illegal narcotics.
  Unfortunately, this is probably their worst nightmare. We announced 
these findings today. It will be interesting to see what kind of a spin 
the media puts on this and also the administration.
  The spin they have attempted to put on is that they are making 
progress. I think we have some facts tonight that dispute that.
  The drug-induced mortality rates, and let me read from the National 
Vital Statistics Report, which is produced just within the last 60 
days, talks about this total of death. It says, in 1998, again a total 
of 16,926 persons died of drug-induced causes in the United States. It 
says the category of drug-induced causes includes not only deaths from 
dependent and nondependent use of drugs, but it also excludes accident, 
homicide, and other causes indirectly related to drug use.
  So the figure that we have here, this 1998 figure, which is our last 
record, is actually a much smaller figure than if we take into account 
all of the drug-related deaths in this Nation.
  Now, the drug czar, Mr. Barry McCaffrey, has testified before our 
subcommittee that if we take all the drug-related deaths in the United 
States on an annual basis, we are approaching 52,000, equal to some of 
the worst casualty figures in any war in which we have been engaged.
  This goes on to report that between 1997 and 1998, the age-adjusted 
death rate for drug-induced causes increased 5 percent from 5.6 deaths, 
now this is in 1 year, increased 5 percent from 5.6 deaths per 100,000 
U.S. standard population to 5.9 percent, the highest it has been 
recorded since at least 1979.
  The rate increased by 35 percent from 1983 to 1988, and that was back 
in the Reagan administration, the beginning of the Reagan 
administration, then declined 14 percent between 1988 and 1990, part of 
the Reagan administration and Bush administration; and it increased 
every year since 1990, beginning I guess the last part of the Bush 
administration. Between 1990 and 1998, the age-adjusted death rate for 
drug-induced causes increased by some startling 64 percent.
  In 1998, the age-adjusted death rate for drug-induced causes for 
males was 2.3 times the rate for females and the rate for the black 
population was 1.4 times the rate for the white population.
  And this also confirms other statistics that have been presented 
before our drug policy subcommittee that in fact those who are harmed 
the most by illegal narcotics are the minority population, including 
the blacks and Hispanics who are suffering right now not only from the 
problem of drug abuse.
  But also, if we looked and examined the deaths here, we would see 
that the minority population is affected on a disproportionate basis.

                              {time}  2245

  In fact, during the Clinton administration, the number of drug-
induced deaths has risen by approximately 45 percent in just 6 years. 
What is interesting, too, in these statistics that we have here is not 
the 1999 murder rate, and we do have the 1999 U.S. murder rate 
according to the FBI's uniform crime statistics. We do not have the 
drug deaths. The last compilation we have is 1998. But in 1999, we 
actually had a falling of the murder rate in the United States to 
15,561. So we have a much greater number of drug-induced drug deaths; 
and we are certain that the figure we will get in 1999 will even exceed 
what we see in 1998. So by a dramatic increase even over this year's 
murders in the United States, we see drug-induced deaths surpassing 
that number.
  Most people are concerned about weapons and destruction of life 
through guns and knives and other means of murder and mayhem. Now we 
have a statistic that should startle every Member of Congress and every 
American, particularly every parent and every community leader, that 
drug-related deaths have exceeded homicides.
  It is ironic that last week one of the communities most hard hit in 
the Nation by illegal narcotics is Baltimore, a beautiful historic city 
just to the north of our Nation's capital. Baltimore has had the 
misfortune of having in the past a very liberal mayor, a very anti-
enforcement mayor, a very pro-narcotics and liberal utilization of 
illegal drugs lack of enforcement in that city over that mayor's 
tenure.
  Fortunately, they have a new mayor, Mayor O'Mally. But Baltimore has 
been ravaged by illegal narcotics and again by a very tolerant policy. 
This headline was last week in the Baltimore Sun. It says ``Overdose 
Deaths Exceed Slayings.'' It again cites that the number of deaths in 
that city by illegal narcotics and drug overdoses exceeds murders in 
the city. In fact, the State medical examiner's office reported that 
324 people died of illegal drug overdose in Baltimore last year, 
passing the total of 309 homicides. In 1998 there were 290 overdose 
victims and 313 homicides. I hope later on to spend a little bit more 
time talking about the policy in Baltimore that turned into a disaster. 
And certainly this community is facing now the same thing that we see 
on a national level.

[[Page 18586]]

This is an urban setting. Baltimore is an urban community. I come from 
a suburban area, the area just north of Orlando, Florida, a very 
family-oriented community and region. We have had, and I have held up 
here headlines from 2 years ago that the number of drug overdose deaths 
exceed homicides in central Florida, also. So we have suburban areas 
that are well-to-do; we have urban areas such as Baltimore that now see 
the same thing happening. We see rural areas impacted by illegal 
narcotics. We see every age bracket impacted by illegal narcotics.
  Unfortunately today we announce that for the entire Nation, drug-
induced deaths have exceeded murders across our land.
  If I may, I would like to also focus on this chart that shows from 
the beginning of the Clinton-Gore administration, some 11,000 drug-
induced deaths, up to 16,926, just shy of 17,000. Again, that 
represents a 45 percent increase under this administration's watch. Now 
I see why they want to talk about prescription drugs now. I see why 
they like to change the subject. Now I see why they like to report any 
glimpse of favorable statistics relating to drug abuse and illegal 
narcotics use, because this in fact is one of the most dismal figures 
and dismal legacies by any administration, Republican, Democrat or in 
any Nation. It is a very sad milestone for this country.
  What really disturbs me, too, is the misuse of some of the data that 
has been released recently. Our Congress has required the 
administration under Public Law 105-277 to establish measurable goals 
in the funds and programs that we assign for combating illegal 
narcotics, particularly in a multibillion-dollar drug education and 
prevention program. We ask the drug czar and the administration to 
report back to the Congress on their efforts to curtail illegal 
narcotics on a performance basis that is measurable so we know that we 
are putting money in and we are getting results out.
  One of the objectives of the report that has come to us was that we 
would reach an 80 percent level of our 12th graders, or young people, 
by the year 2002 perceiving drug use as harmful. That was the goal that 
we reach. Unfortunately, in some of the statistics that have been 
released lately to put a happy face on the drug abuse and misuse 
situation in our country, I have found the administration is changing 
baselines. For example, in 1996, 59.9 percent of the 12th graders 
perceived drug use as harmful. Even after we have run the media 
campaign, we find that in 1998, it dropped to 58.5 percent of the 12th 
graders perceived drug use as harmful. In 1999, they have even 
backslided more according to the information that we have obtained, and 
we are down to some 57.4 percent of the 12th graders now perceive drug 
use as harmful. The goal, remember, was to achieve 80 percent by 2002. 
So it is rather scary that they would take a new base year, 1998, 
rather than 1996, and now claim a 1-year decline, a modest decline and 
change from assessing 12th graders to eighth graders because they did 
find that 73.3 percent of eighth graders saw marijuana use as harmful. 
By using the 73.3 percent of eighth graders, they now only fall 
somewhere around 7 percent from reaching their 80 percent goal.
  These are some of the statistics touted by the administration, but a 
clever change in the group that was surveyed and judged and also 
changing the baseline. But the facts remain pretty clear that in fact 
we have an epidemic of illegal narcotics use among almost every age 
group.
  According to a January 26, 2000, white paper which was published by 
the National Center on Addiction and Substance abuse, which is also 
known as CASA, eighth graders in rural America, if we take out those 
eighth graders in rural America, 83 percent are likelier than eighth 
graders in urban centers to use crack cocaine; 50 percent are likelier 
than eighth graders in urban centers to use cocaine; and 34 percent 
likelier than eighth graders in urban centers to smoke marijuana. And 
104 percent likelier than eighth graders in urban centers to use 
amphetamines including methamphetamines. If we start looking at some of 
the subsections of eighth graders, and in this case this study looked 
at rural eighth graders, we see a horrible trend in illegal narcotics 
use; and we are talking about crack cocaine and methamphetamines which 
have caused a tremendous amount of damage, death and destruction and I 
am sure in this figure of death we would even find those young people.
  We find another report from May of this year that the number of 
heroin users in the United States has increased from 500,000 in 1996 to 
980,000 in 1999. Again, this is not part of the administration's report 
to the American people. Nor would they want to talk about this 
statistic or this legacy, especially so close to the election. The rate 
of first use by children age 12 to 17 increased from less than 1 in 
1,000 in the 1980s to 2.7 in 1,000 in 1996. This is not a statistic 
that we heard touted by the Secretary of HHS or our drug officials.
  First-time heroin users are getting younger, another legacy of this 
administration, from an average of 26 years old in 1991, just before 
they took control of the administration, to an average of 17 years. 
That means the first-time heroin user in 1991 was 26 years of age. They 
have managed to bring that down to 17 years of age by 1997, not a 
pretty statistic; but we see why drug deaths are dramatically 
increasing in the United States.
  According to a very recent Associated Press article, June 11 of this 
year, a survey conducted by the national drug control policy office 
itself said that about 80,000 12- to 17-year-olds and 303,000 18- to 
25-year-olds admitted using heroin in 1998. According to DEA, our Drug 
Enforcement Administration, in 1990 the average age again of someone 
trying heroin was 26.5. We said in 1992 27 years of age, and again this 
administration managed to turn it around to an average of age 17.
  A study conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 
for 15,349 students grade nine through 12 revealed that in 1991, again 
just before this administration won office in 1992, 14 percent of 
students surveyed said they used marijuana. That number increased to 
26.7 percent in 1999. Students reporting that they tried marijuana at 
least once increased from 31.3 percent in 1991 to 47.2 percent in 1999.
  Unfortunately, what we see during the past 7 years has been an 
increase in drug use and abuse in almost every category. We have some 
statistics that do not get publicized. For example, 4 percent, or 
595,640 students, enrolled in grades nine through 12 have used cocaine 
according to the most recent study in the past month.

                              {time}  2300

  That is up dramatically over again the beginning of this 
administration. Methamphetamines, which were not even on the charts at 
the beginning of this administration, we have 99.1 percent or 1,355,018 
students enrolled in grades 9 through 12 have now used methamphetamine, 
almost 10 percent of the students enrolled in grades 9 through 12.
  If you want to worry about drugs and prescription drugs for elderly, 
and that is a serious concern that we must address, and we must make 
certain that those who are elderly and infirm or in need have 
prescription drugs, that is an important topic. But this topic that I 
present tonight is extremely important, particularly to our young 
people, when again we have a startling statistics like this.
  Mr. Speaker, almost 10 percent of our young people have tried 
methamphetamines, and we have again 2.4 percent of our students 
enrolled in grades 9 through 12 have used heroin. Heroin, which we find 
now in a more deadly and potent form than we ever have, and I have 
cited the increases in marijuana use, which have nearly doubled in the 
terms of this administration. 2.8 percent of the students enrolled in 
grade 9 through 12 have injected illegal drugs, that is 268,038 
students, again, in our most recent report.
  These are not statistics again that you will hear from the 
administration, and the media unfortunately does not want to cover this 
problem. They, the media, have a more liberal bent, and

[[Page 18587]]

they have, along with the administration, been guilty of sweeping this 
problem under the table.
  One of the problems that we have, how did we get ourselves into a 
situation with these statistics, with drugs, drug-induced deaths now 
exceeding homicides in the United States. I want to say it was not 
easy. It took the Clinton administration almost 7 years to dismantle 
and systematically take piece by piece apart what was a very effective 
war on drugs.
  Mr. Speaker, in fact, if we look at a period from 1985 to 1992, we 
saw over a 40 percent decrease in drug use in this country. The 
Clinton-Gore administration has failed to make the drug war a top 
national priority. Now, how can a President of the United States make 
drug enforcement, drug prevention, drug education, drug interdiction or 
a war on drug real when only eight times in 7 years, just prior to our 
work this year on the Colombian package, did the President mention the 
war on the drugs in his public addresses.
  As a result, we have witnessed an explosion in drug use and abuse. We 
have witnessed an incredible amount of production of coca, the base for 
cocaine and opium poppy, the base for heroin, in Colombia. And I have 
cited in past special order presentations how this administration 
systematically first stopped in 1994 information sharing to the chagrin 
of even the Democrats, who protested their move, who stopped providing 
surveillance information that could be used in shoot down by other 
countries trying to stop drugs within other countries borders, not U.S. 
forces, but other countries which saw a resurgence in drugs leaving the 
source countries.
  We saw again a policy where aid and assistance was blocked for some 3 
years by a misapplication of our drug certification law, and we saw the 
stopping of aid even appropriated and designated by the Congress to get 
to Colombia that did not get to Colombia, and then finally when some 
few helicopters that we asked 3 years and 4 years for to get there to 
get to the illegal narcotics to go after the traffickers in the 
mountain terrain. When they finally arrived, it was almost in a 
ludicrous situation and a condition that they arrived without proper 
armoring which led us to require this Congress to pass a $1.3 billion 
package in emergency funding just recently. And we saw the President of 
the United States attempt to grandstand and also blur the issue of the 
tragedy that he had helped create in Colombia through very specific 
missteps and policy.
  Despite that billion dollars in aid, we still see a tide of illegal 
narcotics coming into this country, that is because our Panama forward 
surveillance post was closed down, the administration bungled the 
negotiation of keeping our antinarcotics surveillance base in Panama, 
and it may be some 2 years before we get the surveillance capability, 
the forward-operating capability, the interdiction capability. That is 
why we have an incredible supply of drugs coming in and they are 
killing our young people.
  Why are they coming in? Again, because of some direct and 
inappropriate missteps by this administration to stop drugs cost 
effectively at their source and also stop them by taking the military 
out of the surveillance business. And we know that this administration 
from 1992 to 1999, according to this report provided to me as chair of 
the Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy and Human Resources, 
this administration cut antinarcotics flights, they declined from some 
46,264 to 14,770 or some 68 percent from fiscal year 1992 to 1999. That 
is why we have a flood of illegal narcotics, heroin and other drugs in 
our streets and in our communities.
  This report further details, again prepared by the General Accounting 
Office, that the administration cut ship days devoted to supporting 
interdiction of suspected maritime illegal drug shipments, which 
declined 62 percent from 1992 through 1999. So if you wonder why we 
have illegal narcotics in incredible quantities coming in to our 
country, here in fact is the evidence.
  When you close down a real war on drugs, the result is death in our 
streets and now drug-induced deaths have exceeded homicides in our land 
for the first time.
  Mr. Speaker, the other problem that we have and many young people do 
not realize, and even adults who are using the narcotics that are 
coming in, for example, the heroin that is on the streets today, the 
purity levels are incredibly high.
  In the 1970s and 1980s, there were 3 percent and 4 percent, 5 percent 
purity levels in the heroin that was on the streets. Today it is not 
uncommon to find 70 percent or 80 percent pure heroin when mixed with 
other drugs or alcohol is resulting in the deaths drug-induced deaths, 
that we have seen that again have now skyrocketed above murders in the 
United States. Even though the Republican-led Congress has instituted a 
$1 billion antidrug media campaign, we still see us losing the war on 
drugs in the United States for several reasons.
  First of all, we have not had a war on drugs since 1993. The Clinton 
administration, one of its first steps was to dismantle the drug czar's 
office and slash the positions from some 120 down to several dozen. We 
have helped build that back up and with the aid of a new drug czar, 
Barry McCaffrey, we have made some progress in putting Humpty Dumpty 
back together again.
  The interdiction and source country programs are both cut by some 
nearly 50 percent, and that was a further blow to any effective war on 
the drugs. And even with the institution of a $1 billion media campaign 
matched by a billion dollars and donated, we are still far away from 
winning or recreating a real war on drugs. Unfortunately, we found that 
in our subcommittee, the reports that we are getting even dismay us 
more. Heroin users, as I said, are even younger than ever.
  We are finding also that emergency room reports and incidents of drug 
overdose in our hospitals and treatment centers are also dramatically 
on the increase.
  Mr. Speaker, I am told by some local officials that the only reason 
that we do not have even higher death rates by drug-induced deaths is 
that, in fact, we have gotten a little bit better at the emergency 
treatment, but emergency room doctors reported in 1997 and 1998 that 
heroin is involved in four to six visits out of every 100,000 by use, 
12 to 17 up from 1 in 100,000 in 1990. For young adults, from 18 to 25, 
41 emergency room visits in every 100,000 involved heroin up from 19 in 
1991. Among women, in general, the numbers have doubled in a decade. 
Again, more troubling information that comes before our subcommittee.
  Mr. Speaker, we also have reports that dismay me not only about 
illegal narcotics but about other types of addictive habits, and we 
have heard some talk from this administration about cutting down 
tobacco use. Unfortunately, from the President, from the Executive 
Offices of the Presidency, we find that they may talk about tobacco, 
but they have their own way of sending the wrong message.
  When you see the President of the United States smoking a cigar and 
talking about cutting down on tobacco use, it has obviously sent a dual 
message to our young people. Some of the reports that again my 
subcommittee have received that cigar smoking and the numbers of cigar 
smokers and the amount of cigar use is on a dramatic increase.

                              {time}  2315

  This report that our subcommittee received, and this was prepared by 
a number of doctors and a medical report, said the trends in cigar 
smoking between the years 1993 and 1997, the consumption of all types 
of cigars in the United States increased by 46.4 percent, reversing a 
steady decline of 66 percent in cigar consumption from 1964 to 1993.
  Between 1993 and 1997, consumption of large cigars increased some 
69.4 percent. Unfortunately, this is also affecting our college 
population and a survey of some 14,000 college students done in 1999, 
last year, found that 46 percent had either smoked cigarettes, cigars 
or used smokeless tobacco in the previous year.
  Cigar consumption increased by 50 percent between 1993 and 1998, 
reversing a 30-year decline. Of course, I take

[[Page 18588]]

the legacy of having more drug-induced deaths much more seriously than 
I do the cigar smoking report, but it just shows that when you set a 
bad example a bad example is followed by our young people, by our 
college students and by our general population.
  One of the problems we have with this whole illegal narcotics issue 
is lack of national leadership on the issue. When you do not talk about 
it, when you destroy programs that were built up to deal with it, or 
you misdirect resources appropriated by the Congress to resolve the 
problem, we see the results, and they are not very pretty.
  One of the most serious problems that we face today in the area of 
illegal narcotics is a new drug that is on the scene in large 
quantities. Some of these drugs are referred to as designer drugs or 
club drugs. In particular, I want to talk a few minutes about ecstacy. 
We have a July 2000 Joint Assessment of MDMA Trafficking Trends, that 
is ecstacy trafficking trends, which is produced by the National Drug 
Intelligence Center, in cooperation with the Department of Justice Drug 
Enforcement Administration and the U.S. Customs Service. This 
assessment talks about trends in ecstacy. Sometimes our statistic-
counting does not even keep up with what is happening in the real 
world.
  Some of that was evidenced today in the hearing that we conducted 
when we announced that for the first time in the history of our Nation 
that drug-induced deaths, drug-related deaths, exceeded homicides in 
our country. We talked to the statistic-gatherers and sometimes their 
statistics do not keep up with what is happening on the streets. That 
is unfortunate. But we found with this recent report, through, again 
DEA, Customs, Department of Justice, a trend with ecstacy that is 
startling. Nearly 8 million ecstacy pills have been seized by the U.S. 
Customs Service and the Drug Enforcement Administration from January to 
July 2000. That is 20 times the numbers seized in all of 1998.
  An article in USA Today, just a short time ago, stated that U.S. 
Customs seizures of ecstacy have risen some 700 percent in the past 3 
years from some 381,000 tablets in 1997 to more than 3.5 million in 
1999. One of the things that we have learned about ecstacy is most of 
the ecstacy coming into the United States is produced at a very high 
profit, sometimes just a few pennies to produce this ecstacy and 
sometimes the ecstacy tablet sells for somewhere between $20 and $45 a 
tablet in the urban and rural areas of America, so there is high profit 
in this. It is a new drug of choice. It is a drug that young people are 
told is harmless, and it is a drug that is very common in some of the 
raves and youth dance clubs around the country. DEA intelligence 
reports, our drug administration intelligence reports, find that 
ecstacy dealers in Europe have joined with Israeli organized crime 
groups, have also found that more than 80 percent of the ecstacy coming 
into the United States is manufactured in the Netherlands. I am pleased 
to report that our U.S. Customs Service is going to reopen our 
operation in the Netherlands, and we will have agents stationed there. 
We will also increase our resources there to go after some of these 
traffickers, and I appreciate the cooperation of DEA and Customs in 
that effort. When we know where illegal narcotics are coming from, we 
can apply the resources to go after people who are delivering death and 
destruction to our communities.
  Customs officials at Kennedy Airport in New York seized over 1 
million ecstacy pills in just the first nine months of 1999. Ecstacy 
was first identified as a street drug in 1972, but we have never seen 
anything like the amount of ecstacy that has been seized. Just this 
year, since January 1, the U.S. Customs Service reported to our 
subcommittee that it seized over 219,000 ecstacy tablets just in 
Florida, my home State, and they had a street value of almost $7 
million.
  In May of 2000, U.S. Customs officials seized 490,000 ecstacy 
tablets, the largest single amount seized in the United States to that 
date, from a courier at the San Francisco Airport. Right now the Drug 
Enforcement Agency estimates that over 90 percent of all ecstacy 
smuggled into the United States is in capsule or pill form and 10 
percent is in powder form.
  MDMA, again ecstacy, that threat is expected to approach the 
methamphetamine threat that we now see in this country by the year 2002 
or the year 2003. The National Household Survey on Drug Abuse shows an 
increase in lifetime use of ecstacy, MDMA, by almost every age group in 
the country, especially the 18 to 25 age group whose use increased from 
3.1 percent in 1994 to 5 percent in 1998.
  I would just like to say a few more things about ecstacy. We received 
many more reports of bad ecstacy and ecstacy mixed with other drugs 
that is having fatal results across the land. This is a copy of the 
Boston paper, the Boston Globe from last week. The headline on the 
local section said Ecstacy Additives Trouble Activists. It says, law 
enforcement authorities and antidrug activists are warning that new and 
dangerous additives are being mixed into one of the most popular drugs 
sold and used in the city's nightclubs. Law enforcement officials say 
many makers of ecstacy eager to cut costs and meet demand for the 
euphoria-inducing drug among high school and college students are 
lacing the pills with cheaper and more dangerous substances. Of 
particular concern, authorities said, is the use of PMA, a chemical 
recently blamed for the death of an 18-year-old woman in Illinois.
  Our Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy and Human Resources 
is receiving more and more of these reports of bad drugs. They are bad 
in the first place but they have these deadly poison additives to them, 
and young people are dying from them.
  We had testimony yesterday in Atlanta, in a field hearing, from the 
father of a young girl who had ingested one of the designer drugs, and 
she died a most horrible death. Some two years she was on a life 
support system, convulsing. Her body temperature reached 107. At 
several points her heart rate had fallen to 25 and up to 170, literally 
destroying her body until she finally died; two years of suffering 
through a drug that she had taken most innocently.
  Today we held a hearing as we announced again the news that drug-
induced deaths in 1998 exceeded homicides and murders in this country. 
We brought from Florida a couple whose 15-year-old son Michael had 
ingested designer drugs and died, one of the 16,926 who died in 1998. 
Unfortunately, this puts a very human face on a problem which we have 
outlined tonight, and which, again, only shows a part of the problem.
  From time to time, I like to cite some of the happenings around the 
country. I just cited an article about what is happening with ecstacy 
in Boston and this article appeared recently on August 18 in the L.A. 
Times, and it says, Teen Executed Over Drugs. A 15-year-old boy 
allegedly kidnapped from his San Fernando Valley neighborhood was shot 
execution-style as he lay bound and gagged in a shallow grave because 
his older half brother had not paid a $36,000 marijuana debt to a drug 
dealer, authorities said.
  Now, when we compile the year 2000 figures, this death will not 
appear there because it is not drug-induced and it does not meet the 
qualifications. It will be in the 50,000 drug-related deaths cited by 
our drug czar, unfortunately.
  The area that I come from which is, again, a very peaceful, family-
oriented part of our Nation, central Florida, continues to be racked by 
illegal narcotics. While I was home, I had this clipping that I saved 
dated, again, August 29, where a young life was lost; Drugs Take Life 
is the headline; friend charged. Sherry Rich, 19, died early Sunday 
morning of an apparent overdose of ecstacy laced with heroin in an 
apartment complex in my area.
  This is one, September 2, a couple of days later, Apparent ODs At 
Club Kills Two. Two men died and another was hospitalized from apparent 
drug overdoses after they visited an Orange County bottle club. This 
report said they purchased marijuana and some sort of pills, according 
to the Orange County sheriff's deputy.

[[Page 18589]]



                              {time}  2300

  While we hear crack cocaine is now down, even my area continues to be 
inundated. A recent article says Central Florida's crack cocaine 
problem is no longer a front-burner issue; it has been replaced in 
importance by heroin's comeback and the surge of new designer drugs. 
However, this says that crack continues to be a problem along with 
these other drugs. That is referring to my area of representation, 
which is Central Florida, again plagued.
  Mr. Speaker, I received a letter from Mel Martinez, the chairman of 
Orange County, our central legislative body in Orange County, Florida, 
and he writes to me just a few days ago, ``Congressman Mica: Eighty 
heroin overdose deaths have occurred in the 7-county Central Florida 
high-intensity drug traffic area in 1999 alone. The Florida Department 
of Law Enforcement recently released a report prepared by the Medical 
Examiner's Office indicating 48 heroin overdose deaths occurred in 
Miami last year, and 42 occurred in Orlando.''
  Almost every State, every community, every locale, every region of 
this Nation is facing the same thing.
  Tonight we released the statistics that again state that U.S. drug 
deaths from drug-induced deaths in 1998 exceeded murder for the first 
time. Again, if we use 1999 murder figures, we are down in the 15,000 
range. These continue to drop, while drug deaths continue to rise.
  The headlines spell out the story, the threat of Ecstacy reaching 
cocaine and heroin proportions, and tonight we have outlined some of 
what is going on with Ecstacy.
  Mr. Speaker, I do want to take a moment for my colleagues and others 
who may be listening to show what Ecstacy does to the brain. Many young 
people think it is a harmless drug. Dr. Allen Leschner of the National 
Institute of Drug Abuse presented a different grasp, but this just 
shows what happens to the brain. This is the normal brain; this is a 
brain that has absorbed or been affected by the use of Ecstacy. 
Basically, it induces a Parkinson's-type affect on the brain, 
destroying the brain cells, not allowing regeneration of the brain 
cells.
  Not only do we have that, but Ecstacy that is attractively packaged 
in with all kinds of designer labels, which the U.S. Customs Service 
provided us, even fancy symbols that are put on of various designer 
clothing and the cars and things to induce young people to try these 
drugs. But this is the fancy packaging. These are the results. If we do 
not think the results are bad enough, again, to destroy the brain, look 
at the deaths, and many of these, I just read one from my local 
community, they used Ecstacy and other drugs or alcohol with these 
drugs, and also, the drug dealers are now cutting Ecstacy across the 
land with all types of deadly chemicals.
  So this is what we end up with, a horrible situation and the 
destruction of life and limb and also brain. Ecstacy again, reaching 
cocaine and heroin proportions, and high schoolers report more drug use 
from June 9, 2000.
  Again, the administration would rather probably talk about 
prescription drugs, and I do not want to demean in any way the 
importance of that, particularly for our elderly or those who have 
problems paying for legal narcotics, and I am talking tonight about 
illegal narcotics. But, in fact, we have a situation that has basically 
spun out of control. In spite of our good efforts over the past 3 or 4 
years by the new majority, we have somehow missed the mark with the 
administration of the resources that have been provided to this 
administration. It is sad, again tonight, as I conclude, to report that 
for the first time in the history of our country, we have deaths by 
drug-induced means, drug-related deaths exceeding murder across our 
land.
  Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the patience of the staff who have remained 
tonight. This is an important topic and should be on the minds of 
Members of Congress, it should be on our agenda, and it should be 
important to every American that not another American is lost to 
illegal narcotics in this country.

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