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EU's drug agency: Drug market remains resilient, ecstasy makes comeback

Xinhua, June 1, 2016 Adjust font size:

Europe's drug market remains resilient and the drug commonly known as "ecstasy" is making a come-back, according to a report released on Tuesday by the European Monitoring Center for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA) based here.

"The return of MDMA as a common stimulant of choice for young people is illustrative of some of the new challenges posed by the contemporary drug market," the agency said in its annual report.

Around 2.1 million people aged between 15 and 34 used Ecstasy in the past year, the agency revealed.

"Innovation in sourcing precursors, new production techniques, and online supply all appear to be driving a revival in a market now characterised by a diversity of products."

The agency says high-dose powers, crystals and tablets with a range of colors and shapes, as well as sophisticated marketing techniques are helping boost its consumption.

MDMA is becoming more popular, the agency highlighted, with established consumers and a new generation of young users.

"This points to the need for prevention and harm reduction responses to target a new population of users who may be using high-dose products but lack an understanding of the associated risks," the agency said.

The production of MDMA is greatest in the Netherlands, according to the report, adding the country has historically recorded the highest numbers of production sites for this drug.

Other concerns expressed by the agency are rises of overdoses from heroin, the most common illicit drug reported in new European city-level data on hospital emergency presentations.

Cannabis remains the most used drug, with 16.6 million people between the ages of 15 and 34 having used the drug.

The agency calls for Europe's drug policy agenda to embrace a "broader and more complicated set of policy issues than in the past," adding there would be new pharmacological options in future giving people the opportunity to reduce some problems relating to drug use.

Portugal decriminalized drugs in 2001. People caught with less than 10 days worth of drugs is sent to a Commission for the Dissuasion of Drug Addiction rather than to court.

According to the EMCDDA, the use of drugs in Portugal has declined and so has the number of people with HIV and AIDS since the early 2000s. The Center for Intervention on Addictive Behaviors and Dependencies (SICAD) claims that legal measures against drugs does not influence consumption levels. Endit