Kids as young as 13 are becoming addicted to drugs, an addiction expert said yesterday.
Michael Guerin, a counsellor at Cuan Mhuire in Bruree in Limerick, told The Irish Mirror that their waiting list has quadrupled in just two years.
The addiction counsellor said: “We’ve gone from 75 waiting last year to 250 on waiting lists.
“There’s men and women, but it’s mostly young men.”
And worryingly, he said that some are taking drugs from just 13 years of age, moving on from alcohol and cannabis use.
He added: “Cocaine use has become normalised, just like alcohol has.
“Taking a line of cocaine has become a rite of passage, and many are even factoring the price of cocaine into their debs do.
“And they can’t afford these drugs, so many teenagers are selling them as well as taking them.”
Mr Guerin said that our attitude to drugs needs to change, and more needs to be done to teach kids of the dangers of drugs.
He said: “It’s great that they’re talking about setting up these tents to test drugs at festivals, but people shouldn’t feel like they have to do drugs to go to them.
“When will they turn around and realise that they can go to a festival and not do drugs?”
Mr Guerin said that more needs to be done in schools to teach kids of the dangers of drugs in the education system.
He said: “It needs to be on the secondary school curriculum.
“Kids of 12 and 13 need to know the dangers of drugs from a young age.”
Just last month, 19 year old Jack Downey died after taking a bad batch of drugs at popular Indiependence festival in Cork.
And his distraught dad said their is ‘no such thing’ as a bad batch of drugs - it’s all bad.
Johnny Downey said: “It’s so easy for young fellas and young ones to fall into this trap and say, ‘sure look, I’ll get the buzz and be grand, drink a glass of water and be grand tomorrow morning.’
“Jack was well versed on the dangers. I would never have suspected it was going to be our Jack. It affects everybody, the cards and letters we’ve got, we’ve only opened a fraction of them.
“There’s no quality control in this, there’s no such thing as a bad batch, it’s all bad.
“We need to talk, that’s the bottom line.”
In May, another young Tipperary man, John Ryan, died after taking a substance at a house party in May.
Patricia and Denis Ryan later said young adults and their parents needed to be more aware of the dangers of the “rampant” use of drugs.
Denis said in an interview: “His temperature was rocketing and they could not get it down.”
His son’s condition deteriorated and his kidneys were failing.
His liver suffered serious damage and he died two days later.
Mrs Ryan said: We don’t want another family to go through what we’ve been through. People must not let the use of drugs be normalised.”
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