Rody to give Ecija drug rehab center to soldiers
DAVAO CITY – President Duterte said he is giving the 10,000-bedroom mega drug treatment and rehabilitation center at Fort Magsaysay, Nueva Ecija to the Armed Forces of the Philippines.
“I gave it to the soldiers. There are no takers,” the President said in Filipino during the San Beda Law Alumni Homecoming the other night.
Chinese philanthropist Huang Rulun built the facility to help in Duterte’s anti-drug efforts.
He earlier fired former Dangerous Drugs Board chair Dionisio Santiago after the latter called the building of the facility a mistake and that smaller
centers closer to the communities of drug offenders would have been better.
But Duterte pointed out that making it hard for families to visit their loved ones under rehabilitation is exactly the point.
“That is precisely the reason, alienating them in the meantime from all things,” the President said, noting that rehabilitation involves isolating a patient from his or her family for a certain period of time.
He lamented that although the Nueva Ecija facility is a very good area for rehabilitation, there were no takers as families of drug addicts apparently opted for community-based rehab.
But health undersecretary Roger Tong-an said 60 drug dependents who underwent treatment at the mega center are set to graduate on Nov. 29, just in time for the facility’s first founding anniversary next week.
The former drug addicts comprise the third batch of drug surrenderees liberated from their drug addiction, he added.
“They stayed there from four to six months to undergo rehabilitation,” Tong-an said.
He said 102 surrenderees have already graduated from the program and endorsed to the Department of Social Welfare and Development and local government units (LGU) for “reintegration” in the community. A system is also in place to monitor those who have been discharged to ensure they would not go through a “relapse.”
The graduates have also been provided with livelihood training to help them get back on their feet after their release.
Tong-an said that, based on the assessment of health personnel in the community, only one percent of surrenderees have “severe” addiction requiring confinement at the center. The rest can just go through community-based treatment and rehabilitation under LGU supervision.
Data from the Department of Health showed that only 663 drug dependents have so far been admitted at the center, a majority of whom came from the National Capital Region, Region 3 and Region 4-B.
Most of them were unemployed while others were tricycle drivers and construction workers. At least one was identified as a barangay captain.
“A rehabilitation center plays a vital role in our war against illegal drugs. Mere counseling does not work for many drug dependents so it is important for them to be kept away from any influence so they can focus on their rehabilitation,” Tong-an added.