| ObjectOur study aims to investigate the prevalent characteristics and trends of illicit drug use and drug-related criminal cases in the ten areas of Hunan province from2005to the first half of2009. We provide the technical material for the standard management and the assessment of the drug control jobs and make Hunan province collectively share resource with the whole China and world, and then realize the informatization, normalization and scientization. In additional, we provide some key epidemiological indes which is closely related with drug control in Hunan province in order to provide the scientific data for the drug control careers.Methods1. To increase the compatibility with international database platform, we modified the original anti-drug database system from the Ministry of Public Security by multidisciplinary cooperation. Before the investigation, we debugged and pretested the new system and trained all investigators and data entry staffs about its usage.2. By multi-stage cluster sampling, we selected the ten areas of Hunan province as survey regions. We inputed the data registered at the anti-drugs offices from2005to the first half of2009about the illicit drug use cases and drug-related criminal cases by using Form A and Form B respectively. So, we developed the new anti-drug database bank of Hunan province.3. We analysed the data and made a prediction for the trends of illicit drug use and drug-related criminal cases in Hunan province.Results1. The prevalent characteristics of illict drug use registered about the ten areas of Hunan province from2005to the first half of2009. (1) General demographic characteristics:The drug use population tend to be the male (84.0%), unmarried (58.5%), unemployed (73.8%), with junior high school/technique school and low education lelvels (82.3%) and living in countryside (50.5%). Most illicit drug users concentrated in the age of18and39years old (86.9%), among of them, the adolescence accouting for one third, and the female adolescence accouting for the half of the total female drug users (44.9%). The average age was28.5±7.2years old.(2) Drug use patterns:The tradional drugs (opiates) still constitute the main illicit drug use (78.3%), and then the synthetic drug (21.1%). The proportion of heroin use was77.4%and ketamine usewas13.4%in all illicit drug use in the survey. The drug use places were:public venue (52.3%) and private venue (21.8%) and recreational venue (14.6%) with different variation in the ten areas. Inhalation is main use route, accounting for57.7%, and then injection (mainly venous injection), accounting for31.4%. At the same time, inhalation combining with injection is nearly the same rate as injection. The reported sharing needle rate was only3.1%.2. The prevalent characteristics and tendency of drug-related criminal cases in the ten areas of Hunan province from2005to the first half of2009.(1) General demographic characteristics:The drug-related criminal individuals tend to be the male (88.5%), married (47.5%), Han people (99.0%), with junior high school/technique school and below education lelvels (82.3%) and unemployed (71.3%). Most drug-related criminals concentrated in the age of18and39years old (95.2%). The average age was34.2±9.4years old.(2) The characterics of the drug-related criminal cases:①Our studies had899cases in total. There were3cases before2005. The cases in2005,2006,2007and2008were gradually increasing,and the number of the cases were respectively28(3.1%),123(13.7%),205(22.8%) and325(36.2%),215cases (23.9%) in the first half of2009.②Smuggling, selling, transporting and producing illicit drug constitute the main categories of the cases (94.8%), and then illegal possession of drug (3.7%). The local areas were the main criminal activity scenes (94.4%). The drug control sections were the main constitutes of the cases of the reception, registering and solving (all accounting for60%or so). Submitting official report on case was the main clue source of the solving crimes (52.7%). Non-organized (97.6%), non-criminal syndicate (99.6%) and non-gang properties (95.5%) were the main criminal nature. The criminals mainly had no previous arrests of the drug-related crime (67.6%). There were no obvious difference whether somebody used illicit drug or not, respectively accounted for38.4%and34.9.(3)The result of the comparison between the cites and the countrysides:There were436cases in the cities (48.5%) and463cases at the countryside (51.5%) among899cases,In the cities, drug control sections which recepted, registered and solved the cases nearly got close proportion to the local police station, but at the countrysides,the former was six times as high as the latter. The second place of the clue source of solving the cases in the cities was further interrogating (23.7%), but secret detection at the countrysides (16.6%).(4) Trends of the drug-related criminal cases registered at the first time in the ten areas of Hunan province from2005to the first half of2009.①Totally, the trend of number of the cases showed in the gradually increasing status.②With the chi square test and trend chisquare test,there were statistic significance (P<0.05) about the marriage, cities and countrysides, recepting cases, registering cases, solving cases and clue souce of the criminals. It showed that they had the difference every year from2005to2008, and in the first half of2009. At the same time, the variables of totally offering the decreasing trend were married criminals, the clue source of solving cases which came from the futher interrogating and drug control sections which were reception, registering and solving cases, on the contrary, the variables of the clue source of solving cases which came from reporting case to the security authorities and the local police stations which were reception, registering and solving cases.(3) The chi square test of nationality, culture degree, occupation and whether criminals used illicit drug or not had statistic significance (P<0.05), but their trend chisquare test all had no statistic significance. It showed that they had the difference every year from2005to2008, and in the first half of2009, but still had no trend.Conclusions1. From2005to2009, the drug users in the ten areas of Hunan province tended to be the male, unmarried, low education lelvels and unemployed. The tradional drugs (opiates) still constituted the main illicit drug use, nevertheless it tended to be stable, and then the synthetic drug. ketamine was the first in all illicit synthetic drug. Inhalation is main use route, and then injection. But inhalation combining with injection is nearly the same rate as injection. We must pay much attention to this problem.2. From2005to2009, the drug-related criminal cases in the ten areas of Hunan province tended to be the male, married, low education lelvels and unemployed. Their trend:Totally, the number of the cases showed the gradually increasing trend. Initially predicted, after2009the gradually increasing variables of the drug-related criminal cases of the ten areas of Hunan province were the clue source of solving cases which came from reporting case to the security authorities and the local police stations which were reception, registering and solving cases, on the contrary, married criminals, the clue source of solving cases which came from the futher interrogating and drug control sections which were reception, registering and solving cases. |
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