Opiate substitution treatment keeping 80% of heroin addicts clean

THE province’s war on heroin addiction has been ramped up, with up to 80 percent of heroin addicts on a new opiate substitution treatment programme remaining clean since its inception.

The success at the Sultan Bahu centre in Mitchells Plain is due to an innovative programme, which included medication that helps with withdrawal and craving, and a multidisciplinary team of doctors, social workers and a psychiatric nurse, Social Development MEC Albert Fritz said.

Heroin flooded the province in recent years and devastated countless lives. Heroin addiction is also one of the most difficult to break.

During a visit to the centre yesterday, Fritz said that in just over a year of the pilot project, the programme had delivered world-class results.

He said recovering addicts were given a cocktail of drugs as part of the treatment. His department had allocated R1.8 million to the programme.

“This is a pilot project and the programme will be rolled out to drug hot-spot areas in the metro,” Fritz said.

Davids said the treatment was innovative.

“Since we started the programme we have clients that are clean for months. Treatment demand has escalated,” Davids said.

Centre director Shafiek Davids said the main medica- tion was Suboxone, which was taken once a day.

Recovering addict Letitia du Plessis said she had joined the programme after 16 years of drug use. She was motivated to quit because she did not want her two children to follow her example.

“I decided to be clean so that I can be a better person and not live a life of a drug addict all my life.

“I am grateful that I am clean today and attending a skills programme through the centre, where we are taught how to make sofas and to start our own businesses,” said Du Plessis.

“To change it must come from you, not from your friends or family. Self-empowerment works,” she said.

The department has for this financial year allocated just over R1.8 million to the programme, which has already taken on 15 new clients, of which 93.3 percent are testing drug-free in their care.

The department provides additional funding to the Sultan Bahu Centre for the provision of general substance abuse treatment for 600 people this financial year and aftercare services for 360 people.

“We cannot do this alone. If we are to achieve our targets, we must continue to build partnerships with NGOs, the private sector and communities. We can beat substance abuse if we continue to work better together,” said Fritz.

To change it must come from you, not from your friends or family