LONDON, Nov. 6 (Xinhuanet) -- The Thames, the river running through the British capital of London, is awash with cocaine as Londoners snort more than 150,000 lines of the class A drug every day, Sunday Telegraph reported.

    An investigation by the newspaper found that, after cocaine had passed through users' bodies and sewage treatment plants, an estimated 2 kg of the drug went into the river each day.

    The figure is 15 times higher than official Home Office statistics and equates to four out of every 100 people regularly taking cocaine, or up to 250,000 of the capital's 6 million residents.

    Anti-drug campaigners were quoted by the paper as saying on Saturday that the findings showed that cocaine use was a ticking "healthcare time bomb" and calling for the government to take drastic action.

    The Thames investigation, the first of its kind in Britain, wasconducted by scientists using the latest technology and regarded as the most accurate large-scale drug-detection method available, the paper said.

    Britain's illicit cocaine trade, estimated to be worth 325.8 million pounds (586.4 million US dollars) a year, is thought to have caused 139 deaths in 2002, a seven-fold rise on the 1996 figure of 19.

    Doctors fear that, with little routine testing for the drug in heart attack and stroke cases, the real toll may be much higher. Enditem