Injection drug use in an affluent beachside community in Sydney: An exploratory qualitative study.

Unlike many of the participants featured in the literature, our study participants grew up in middle and upper middle-class households, typically experiencing comfortable childhoods with little to no exposure to injection drug use. In this setting injection drug use operates covertly within the normal rhythms of middle-class life, hidden in amongst the bustle of cafés and shopping centres, and through the friendliness of neighbourhood driveway and doorstep interactions. Drug use is described as common in the area, with injecting behaviours stigmatised in ways that set it against the 'good' families and neighbourhoods of this beach-side enclave. In contrast to much of the Australian qualitative literature which frames injection drug use as a means of psychological relief or a subcultural norm, our participants described injecting as motivated by the desire to enhance pleasure and social connection.