Reporting for the London Free Press - Randy Richmond spent several months investigating issues of oxycodone addiction in the London region. He interviewed persons in their addiction, police officers, community support workers, clients attending to Clinic 528 for Methadone Treatment, a pain specialist and Dr. John Craven - Associate Director of Clinic 528.

Randy Richmond also attended to several Recovery Support Groups that take place at Clinic 528. He seemed interested to learn about the problem from the inside out. He heard it straight - from those who'd been deep in opiate addiction.

The first of five articles was published in the Free Press on Saturday, October 27. It is reprinted in part below. Use the Audio Player at the top of this page - to hear a CBC Radio interview with Randy from Tuesday, October 30.

Part IIIb: Questions to Dr. Roman Jovey . . .

Part I - Oxy, Oxygen, M&Ms, 80s, Oxycotton. Killer.

The drug sweeping London's downtown streets, workplaces and suburbs goes by many nicknames. But it has one effect on police, civic officials, social service and health-care workers, users and those dealing in drug subculture -- alarm. And it's ravaging London like few other cities in the province, police say.

A $3.7-million, five-year plan to combat substance abuse will be unveiled at city hall Monday. It is the drug of this city right now - said Sgt. David MacDonald, head of one of the police's two street drug units.

The opioid called oxycodone is so powerful, so easy to get and so hard to kick, it's fueling crime, ravaging the vulnerable, and turning ordinary middle-class citizens into sellers and buyers.

What makes it tough to tackle is the source. It's not made in makeshift labs, grown in basements or shipped in from other countries. Most comes from London doctors' offices, then gets 'diverted' to the underworld.

Signs of its rise are everywhere:

- OxyContin, the most popular oxycodone based painkiller, is the most commonly injected drug among needle users in London, recently surpassing heroin.

- Opioid abuse is rising to one of the top three problems cited by people seeking help at Addiction Services of Thames Valley. In most areas, it is tied with or nearing crack, cocaine and cannabis.

- In Ingersoll, opioid abuse ranks behind only alcohol, traditionally the No. 1 cited problem among people getting outpatient counselling.

- The Children's Aid Society of Middlesex London is seeing more and more parents hooked on OxyContin and other painkillers.

- In 2004, only 86 police occurrences, such as break-ins and thefts, could be identified as fueled mainly by oxycodone addiction. By 2006, the number of police occurrences had jumped to 261.

- OxyContin is the drug of choice -- supplanting crack -- among sex-trade workers in London, police say, and 100 per cent of the about 80 women working in the sex trade use drugs.

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