‘Cocaine is in GAA every club, it’s frightening’ – Limerick legend Ciarán Carey

“It’s frightening where it’s after going in the last year and a half, frightening! There isn’t too much talk about it in the GAA because it’s such a taboo subject. It mightn’t be a popular thing to say, but it’s reality and it’s real,” Carey told the Irish Independent.

“It’s rippling through most villages and parishes in the country and there aren’t too many clubs where cocaine isn’t alive. I wouldn’t be a bit afraid to say that about all codes; soccer, rugby, GAA or whatever, it’s gone that serious.”

Carey outlines how some GAA clubs are making strides to solve the growing issue by educating their members about the dangers involved, but he is abhorred with how drug use has been normalised in recent years.

“People are trying to normalise it and make it as if it’s somebody having a cigarette outside, ‘Sure go out and have a line instead of a fag, You’re fine, no one will really mind’. That will be disastrous as a nation if we continue to go down that road,” he added.

“Fifteen years ago, you’d be lucky to get a bit of hash in villages and now these places are awash with cocaine and tablets so that’ll tell you how far it’s after coming. It isn’t going away and it’s actually growing.

“I’m flabbergasted with the way it is allowed to go where it’s going. It doesn’t take a vacation, there’s no Bank Holiday for addictions, so I’m going to do my best to confront it in whatever way I can.

“Addiction has no boundaries. It’s inevitable that anyone who takes cocaine recreationally, if you take it long enough and often enough then the drug will snap them and hijack them.

“You’re masking, you’re hiding, you’re ducking and diving from something, you’re obviously taking this to cope. I need to stress also, this isn’t just a male issue, cocaine is fairly strong in both sexes.”

Read the full interview here.