Friday 18 September 2009

New drug treatment centre for the valleys?

Good news this week from the diamorphine-on-prescription trials which have been running in England.

In One Wales, there is a committment which reads:

"We will, in relation to substance misuse, further integrate the principles of harm-reduction models by considering, if the evidence supports it, adoption of the pilot programmes currently underway in England."

In 2007, I did some research which showed much higher levels of referrals for heroin treatment programmes in former coalfield areas. I hope this research will show that there is a strong case for a pilot to be set up somewhere in the valleys.

2 comments:

Sweet and Tender Hooligan said...

It is absolutely essential to roll out such treatments.

landsker said...

Hi Leanne,
Good post, many might be suprised to learn that since 2006,in terms of natural opiates, Britain`s NHS is supplied almost totally from UK farms.
Furthermore, all that trade is a monopoly, controlled by
Mcfarlane Smith, a Scottish pharmaceutical company.

Addicts are mostly using imported Afgan heroin, the suppliers of which are not paying Afghan or UK taxes!

... A real money maker, having a market which allows them to charge 6 times more than what the Dutch pay for their supplies, and up to 50 times more than prices in Asia. All from the public purse. The tragedy of heroin abuse is an issue that needs urgent attention, permit me if you will, to link to another blog, "Transform", which highlights the heroin trials and articulates the need for drug law reform.
Also, why is Wales "importing" expensive heroin from Scotland... are we unable to produce our own?