Dr Franz Trautmann is from the Netherlands Institute of Mental Health and Addiction in Amsterdam. His Swiss colleague Dr Robert Haemmig is from the University of Psychiatric Service in Berne. Both men are at the leading edge of treatment of drug users in Europe and are in Australia to see how Government and agencies here, such as this Salvation Army centre in Melbourne, are coping with the heroin epidemic. Our policy might have supported in a way by normalising heroin use in a way. It's just one of the health problems young people have to face.
Alcohol is in fact a much bigger problem.
Nicotine is also in fact a much bigger problem. That's the same in Australia. One of the most unpleasant findings to confront doctors Trautmann and Haemmig was not just the dramatically increasing size of Australia's heroin population, but the fact addicts are getting younger and younger in direct contrast to the European experience. We can see this from our services. There are nearly no new young users coming into the services.