TY  - JOUR
PY  - 1999//
TI  - Opioid overdose mortality in Australia, 1964-1997: birth-cohort trends
JO  - Medical journal of Australia
A1  - Hall, W. D.
A1  - Degenhardt, L. J.
A1  - Lynskey, M. T.
SP  - 34
EP  - 37
VL  - 171
IS  - 1
N2  - OBJECTIVE: To examine trends in rates of opioid overdose deaths from 1964 to 1997 in different birth cohorts. DESIGN: Age-period-cohort analysis of national data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Annual population rates of death attributed to opioid dependence or accidental opioid poisoning in people aged 15-44 years, by sex and birth cohort (in five-year intervals, 1940-1944 to 1975-1979). RESULTS: The rate of opioid overdose deaths increased 55-fold between 1964 and 1997, from 1.3 to 71.5 per million population aged 15-44 years. The rate of opioid overdose deaths also increased substantially over the eight birth cohorts, with an incidence rate ratio of 20.70 (95% confidence interval, 13.60-31.46) in the 1975-1979 cohort compared with the 1940-1944 cohort. The age at which the cumulative rate of opioid overdose deaths reached 300 per million fell in successive cohorts (for men, from 28 years among those born 1955-1959 to 22 years among those born 1965-1974; for women, from 33 years among those born 1955-1959 to 27 years among those born 1965-1969). CONCLUSIONS: Heroin use in Australia largely began in the early 1970s and rates of heroin use have markedly increased in birth cohorts born since 1950.<p /> <p>Language: en</p>
LA  - en
SN  - 0025-729X
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/
ID  - ref1
ER  -