Alcohol Price Spike Fuels "switch" To Ecstasy

These price spikes could in theory control what drugs people buy, and maybe in term could effect the amount bought all together, bringing that number much lower....Heres the Article...

"A NEW phenomenon of young people ''switching'' to the increasingly cheap party drug ecstasy has been fuelled by rising alcohol prices, according to drug researchers, nightclub owners and the people themselves"

"The rise in alcohol prices was in part fed by federal Labor's 2009 alcopops tax.

The Age has found that while alcohol prices have risen sharply since 2005, ecstasy prices have fallen across countries by close to the same amount.

Australian Bureau of Statistics figures show that a shot of scotch in a public bar increased 25 per cent in five years. A 285 millilitre glass of beer is 23 per cent more expensive. Slabs of heavy beer cost 15 per cent more. Some Melbourne boutique bars now charge up to $14 for a single bottle of Smirnoff Ice Double Black, a flavoured vodka alcopop.

"Meanwhile, ecstasy prices have fallen 21 per cent across Australia in the same period." 

These price differences are almost the same...This can be assumed that the reason the ecstasy has dropped nearly the same amount as the alcohol has gone up, is because of the price increase over the years...

A 21-year-old student teacher said ecstasy was as common as ''buying drinks''. She said four years ago she would have been shocked to learn friends were using it but now it ''doesn't surprise me at all''.

A spokesman for federal Health Minister Nicola Roxon told The Age the government was concerned about ecstasy use among young women. It would spend $21 million over four years on an anti-drugs message through social networking.

But the spokesman denied the alcopops tax - which raised the price of pre-mixed drinks by 70 per cent in a bid to curb binge drinking - encouraged the use of cheap drugs.

Dr Jenny Chalmers, drug and alcohol senior research fellow at the University of New South Wales, said the issue was untested.

''It could be the case that young people might use more ecstasy or start using it when the price of alcohol increases. However, the evidence from the very few studies worldwide on switching from alcohol to illicit drugs is inconclusive.''

''Why would you buy a $10 bottle of Smirnoff when you can buy cheap drugs?'' Ms Tsamis said. ''If it's too expensive to buy alcohol they'll look to different ways to entertain themselves. I've had 300 people in the club and there has been fewer than eight people at the bar. People are doing drugs everywhere. It has become normal..."
 

Chris Johnston and Ashley Argoon
October 23, 2010

http://www.theage.com.au/national/al...022-16xvj.html"

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