Deaths from alcohol and other drugs rose 32 percent in 2006 in Boston, and officials are blaming the trend on factors like greater availability of cheap heroin, the rising popularity of methamphetamine, and widespread legal and illicit use of powerful painkillers, the Boston Globe reported May 9.

Alcohol and other drug abuse was the fifth-leading cause of death in the city in 2006, according to a draft of the annual Health of Boston report. Three times more Bostonians died of addiction-related causes than were murder victims. The South End of Boston was the epicenter of drug deaths in the city.

"It's really difficult when you talk to these parents of 25-year-old kids and they don't even suspect their kid has a problem, and then they're dead," said Michael Botticelli, director of the state's Bureau of Substance Abuse Services.

"We easily see an overdose a day," said Rich Serino, chief of Boston's Emergency Medical Services. "And some days, more."

Statewide, opiate-related overdose deaths rose from 94 in 1990 to 637 in 2006.

Illicit drugs caused about three-quarters of substance-related fatalities in Boston, with the rest caused by alcohol poisoning or alcohol-related diseases. The death rate among women doubled between 2005 and 2006, when 54 women died because of alcohol or other drug causes.