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veggie
Registered: 07/25/04
Posts: 17,504
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Failure to help drug addicts is costing Britain £3.6bn a year
#14634803 - 06/18/11 05:59 PM (12 years, 9 months ago) |
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Failure to help drug addicts is costing Britain £3.6bn a year June 18, 2011 - independent.co.uk
Failure to help hundreds of thousands of addicts get free of drugs is costing Britain £3.6bn a year in welfare and prescriptions for methadone, according to a report released today.
The Centre for Policy Studies think-tank accuses David Cameron of failing to deliver on his pledge to help people get off drugs.
The report, Breaking the Habit: Why the State Should Stop Dealing Drugs and Start Doing Rehab, cites comments made by the Prime Minister late last year, when he described methadone as "a government-authorised form of opium".
Mr Cameron pledged to provide more residential treatment programmes and added: "The way you get drug addicts clean is by getting them off drugs altogether, challenging their addiction rather than just replacing one opiate with another."
Yet while the heroin substitute remains a common treatment for addicts, the number of referrals to rehabilitation units has fallen to an all-time low of 3,914. There are only 1,872 beds now available at "affordable" levels of around £500-£600 per week, with none on the NHS, and the sector is "in near-terminal crisis", according to the report.
Its author, Kathy Gyngell, said: "By sponsoring addiction, drug treatment has entrenched a costly dual dependency – on drugs and on welfare."
Three-quarters of those in treatment programmes are on methadone, amounting to 150,000 people. Many people spend years on the drug, which now accounts for a quarter of all drugs poisoning deaths, says the report from the right-wing think-tank.
The latest figures on prison drug tests, obtained by The Independent on Sunday, reveal 3,500 inmates tested positive for prescribed and illicit methadone – a 55-fold increase over the previous five years.
Methadone became a recommended treatment for heroin addicts in the late 1980s, when the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs declared that the spread of HIV/Aids was a bigger threat to the public than drug misuse. Prescribing methadone – a drug that stops heroin addicts from experiencing the pain of withdrawal – and providing clean needles for addicts were part of a "harm reduction" response to drug addiction that continued under New Labour.
The cost to the state of maintaining addicts on methadone has doubled since 2002-03 to £730m a year. Drug users are estimated to receive £1.7bn in benefits a year, while the welfare costs of looking after the children of drug addicts are estimated at a further £1.2bn a year.
The report comes just weeks after British celebrities urged Mr Cameron to decriminalise drug possession, and the Global Commission on Drug Policy said that the war on drugs had failed and that it was time for "fundamental reforms" in drug policies.
A Department of Health spokesperson said the Government's drugs strategy, which includes the use of "talking therapies", detox and drug-based treatments is "fundamentally different from those that have gone before".
He added: "Instead of focusing on reducing the harms caused by drug misuse, our approach will be to go much further and offer every support for people to choose recovery as an achievable way out of dependence."
"There is no 'one-size-fits-all' solution," said Martin Barnes, chief executive of DrugScope. "Access to a range of services and support is vital to supporting recovery, regardless of the types of treatment provided."
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PeterGriffin467
Dirt Grub
Registered: 09/18/07
Posts: 6,647
Loc: six feet under
Last seen: 11 years, 2 months
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Re: Failure to help drug addicts is costing Britain £3.6bn a year [Re: veggie]
#14634944 - 06/18/11 06:48 PM (12 years, 9 months ago) |
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This guy is full of shit just like every other person before him who has spouted off the same bullshit about ORT for opiate addicts. I remember reading or watching a show the other day that said 12 step based recovery only has a 5% success rate but they cant even take credit for that because by default 5% of all drug addicts according to statistics will up and quit drugs and get clean all on their own accord. I would have alot more respect for drug treatment centers if they werent all about charging astronomical prices that no average person can afford. Inpatient rehabs are big business and when yo think about it in reality most of these places dont realy want you to get clean, they benefit from it if you relapse and keep coming and going from treatment like it has a revolving door. There are some genuine drug counselors out there (my last one for example) but most are full of shit. Also what makes me mad is how these detox places that cost 10 grand or however much to "detox" you, all they fucking do is give you bupe for a week or two. Sorry but I can do that shit on my own, I dont need a "professional" to dose me with bupe and charge me thousands of dollars.
-------------------- "I just need to check inside ya asshole SIR.... Asshole clear!"
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Diacetylmentlegen
Gentleman
Registered: 06/13/10
Posts: 267
Loc: Ireland
Last seen: 11 years, 8 months
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Re: Failure to help drug addicts is costing Britain £3.6bn a year [Re: PeterGriffin467]
#14636489 - 06/19/11 06:00 AM (12 years, 9 months ago) |
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Funny idea: Why not allow people to... "buy" substances they wish to use, providing "tax" to the state, which may be used to "fund" services such as healthcare or education.
It's a crazy whacked-out idea but it just might work.
-------------------- "When I recall it and when I recall various other symptoms... I think the simplest explanation is... that I had these experiences, that they were real... and that they took place outside time." - Christopher Mayhew
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