Illicit drugs are "swamping towns and villages" all over Ireland, a conference in Kerry heard yesterday.
Parents and those in rural communities needed to "wake up" and become aware of the widespread drug culture, the conference, Getting a Grip 2005, heard. It has been organised to help local authorities and the public service tackle drug and alcohol abuse.
Tony Hickey, a former Garda assistant commissioner and a senior figure with the Garda national drugs unit, said opiate or heroin use was still largely confined to the greater Dublin area, Limerick and to a lesser extent Cork and Athlone.
It was also available in a small number of midland towns. Although it had extended geographically, it had not done so in epidemic proportions.
However, recent research and Garda intelligence showed a different trend with cocaine, which had gone national.
"Intelligence coming back shows demand right across the country," said Mr Hickey.
He said cocaine was unfortunately classed as a recreational drug but was addictive psychologically. International research indicated cocaine was used right across the social spectrum, particularly among the professional classes in the last decade in the US.
He said 70 per cent of crime from drugs was cannabis related. The Garda had liaison officers in Spain and France to help tackle the trafficking of the drug from Morocco.
Most people, whether in rural Ireland or in large cities, were introduced to drugs by "pals, friends and acquaintances", and the notion of strangers peddling drugs at school gates was in his experience of 40 years as a garda "an urban myth".
Cocaine, unlike heroin, was now seen as a "cool drug", the conference heard, while heroin was seen as "the scum of the earth".
Dublin city councillor Andrew O'Connell, a member of the anti-drugs movement for 20 years, urged parents to stop closing their eyes to the problem. "Drugs are swamping small towns and villages."
Other contributors urged parents to learn the drug nicknames to understand what their children were referring to.
Dr Joe Barry, medical adviser to the national drug strategy team and a senior lecturer in public health at TCD , said: "In any town in Ireland illicit drugs are available."