Source:  Newsweek, Oct 30, 1995 p74(1).
                                                                           
 Title:  A risky Rx for fun. (abuse of drug Ritalin)
   Author:  John Leland
                                                                         
Abstract:  The drug Ritalin is usually prescribed for children with attention deficit/hyperactive 
disorder, but the drug is being used by high school and college students to get high. Such use has 
become popular as the drug has gotten easier to obtain, as two million people use it for medical 
reasons.
                                                                         
Lisa L., 18, tried ritalin for the first time last year. She had just come to Colgate College, in rural 
upstate New York. "Some of my friends were excited because they had some," says Lisa (not her 
real name). "I think one of their younger siblings had a prescription." Allowing half a 35-mg tablet 
per  person, the group crushed the pins and snorted them like cocaine. For Lisa it was an 
immediate rush. "It makes you really hyperactive," she says. "Anything you want to read, you 
want to read it right then. Anything you want to do, you want to do it right then: organize your 
room, organize your life." She says she has taken the drug occasionally since, and knows a 
number of students who use it: to study, to write papers or just for the buzz. She describes the 
high as "very extreme ... You get a bad headache afterwards."

Ritalin is the brand name for methylphenidate, a stimulant prescribed to children and some adults 
with attention deficit/hyperactive disorder (ADHD). Until recently, both the diagnosis and the 
treatment were fairly uncommon. But in the last five years, as ADHD has become a fashionable 
diagnosis, Ritalin consumption has risen nearly sixfold, according to the DEA. About 2 million 
Americans will take the drug this year - including more than one in every 30 kids ages 5 to 18. 
with that growth has come a rise in recreational use, especially in high schools and colleges. "You 
have now unlocked the secret door of the 1990s," says Dr. Herbert Nieburg, a substance-abuse 
expert in New York. "The abuse of Ritalin."

Matt, a sophomore at Colgate, started taking the drug last year. He'd been drinking, and snorted a 
20-mg dose. "You can drink a lot more with it," he says. "I felt like my head was working really 
quickly." With so much Ritalin in circulation, it's easy to get; students sell or give away their 
prescriptions. Drug professionals put the going rate at $3 to $15 a hit. As the year wore on, Matt 
started taking it to help focus on his schoolwork. Soon he was snorting it at least twice a day. 
"You definitely need more and  more. The number of times you do it in a day increases. There's a 
real tendency for addiction." These days Matt has cut back, using it "strictly recreationally," but 
points to a friend who is getting "really dependent. If he has to drive a long way he'll get nervous 
if he doesn't have any."

Bad news, good news: It is not clear how many people take Ritalin recreationally, or how often. 
The drug is addictive and, especially if snorted, can have side effects: strokes, hyperthermia, 
hypertension or seizures. A Virginia teen died last April after snorting Ritalin on top of beer. But 
these are rare cases; few users end up in rehab or emergency rooms. Most authorities contacted for 
this story consider Ritalin abuse a small problem with the potential to become bigger. But Lisa A. 
Herz, a clinical social worker who treats adolescents with drug or alcohol problems, says she has 
seen a big increase in Ritalin cases, usually in combination with other drug use. "Now 25 percent 
of the kids I see are taking Ritalin," Herz says. She calls it mostly a "white, upper-middle-class 
phenomenon, like anorexia: it's not widespread, it's concentrated." This is the bad news as well as 
the good news. As Lisa L. admits, "If pot was a 10 [in prevalence], Ritalin would be a 1. But 
among a certain crowd, it is [common]. It's very exclusive. I don't think many people would do 
something so stupid." If a high is out there, though, some kids are going to try it. And right now 
Ritalin, endorsed by the medical establishment, is out there in a big way.

Full Text COPYRIGHT 1995 Newsweek Inc.