Getting help for drug addiction
This is the second installment of a three-part series about drug use and addiction among Jamaicans. It chronicles the battle and triumphs of addicts and examines the various programmes in place to help people kick the habit.
THE Association of Friends and Families of Substance Abusers (AFAFOSA), a not-for-profit body which was formed in 2003 and was re-launched earlier this year, is working to improve the lives of addicts like Roland Green, Fitzroy Brown, Kevin, Bruce, Max and ‘Munchie’.
In fact, the association’s mission is to “facilitate, educate, transform and empower the mind, body and spirit of persons affected”.
But the group of young addicts who recently shared their stories with the Sunday Observer were apparently unaware of the work of AFAFOSA, calling instead on the authorities to go more for them.
“We want help, man,” Brown had complained. Brown and his ‘friends’ spend most of their days ‘hanging out’ at a drug hotspot in New Kingston notoriously known as ‘The Gulf’.
The association – which is indirectly affiliated with the Drug Court system and works to assist in the rehabilitation of substance abusers through seminars, conferences, workshops and training by personnel from the National Association of Drug Court Professionals and other international agencies – is hoping to extend its reach. Currently, AFAFOSA (with headquarters in Florida) is developing plans and projects to enhance its objectives.
Their primary focus is raising money to support the work of the main drug rehabilitation centres located at Bellevue and the Maxfield Health Clinic in Kingston.
“The focus is always on getting help for substance abusers and our main aim is to provide financial help. We are looking at funding our projects as best as we can and also provide assistance to affected families. We are currently planning our fundraisers,” AFAFOSA’s president Steve Ashley told the Sunday Observer during a recent discussion with the organisation’s directors.
For Detective Sergeant Barbara Josephs, who works with the constabulary’s Narcotics Division, coming in contact with drug abusers on a regular basis takes her into a world she would never want her children to visit.
“What I find with drug and substance abusers is that it’s just a bad habit that many of them cannot get rid of. Some of them are willing to stop if the help is available. They really have a need to be rehabilitated but finding a way to do so is the problem,” said Josephs, emphasising that the fund-raising efforts of AFAFOSA are crucial. “In a lot of cases you will find that the drug abusers are normal people who want to get out of it. They need support. They need counselling.”
Getting hooked, getting clean
Some medical experts say the addictive potency of drugs varies from substance to substance and from individual to individual. Drugs such as codeine and strong alcoholic beverages typically require many more exposures to hook their users than drugs like cocaine and heroin. At the same time, someone who is psychologically or genetically predisposed to addiction is much more likely to suffer from it.
According to Josephs, drugs are very easily accessible across Jamaica, especially in the Corporate Area.
“Drugs are sold everywhere. And in Downtown Kingston the men and women who run some of those stalls are actually drug vendors. Roadside stalls are known for selling marijuana and other illegal substances,” Josephs told the Sunday Observer.
Even so, the reasons for persons getting hooked on drugs are numerous and varied.
“For many addicts, taking drugs takes you to that high, that peak and that’s where you always want to go. So gradually, after a while, the addiction creeps in and if it’s not dealt with it gets worse until you lose control of yourself. And you have the Rastas who believe that the ‘weed’ they smoke is Biblically ordained and that they have a right to take it,” Josephs said. “But what many fail to realise is that abuse hurts you in the long run. So with the counselling and the programmes we have and the work that the drug court does is to show them a better way.”
That’s precisely why local out-patient clinics like the Bellevue Centre and the Maxfield Park Drug Centre are crucial. Under the leadership of Dr Myo Oo, the facilities offer a combination of individual counselling and group counselling. According to Dr Oo, the most common drug abused by persons who seek treatment at the clinic is marijuana, followed by cocaine. Intravenous and inhalants are very rare.
“Jamaicans don’t like needles. We have a strong ganja culture. We mainly offer drug treatment and rehabilitation for abusers charged with minor offences at the Drug Court based on the provisions of the 1999 Drug Court Act and its 2001 updated regulations,” Oo told the Sunday Observer during an interview at the Half-Way-Tree court house. “Once offenders are recommended for the rehabilitation programme, we screen them for eligibility and their criminal histories, and then do a final analysis if they are to be accepted,” added Oo, who is also the senior medical officer at the Bellevue Hospital.
The six-month rehabilitation programme consists of three phases of two months each, and involves individual and group counselling, family consultations, psycho-dynamic approach and weekly urine testing of the participants. The age of participants, mostly males, range for 18 to 56. Since its inception in 2001, over 500 persons from Kingston, Montego Bay and other parts of the island have participated. More than 30 per cent have successfully graduated.
“Throughout the six-month programme, we stress and look for punctuality, quality of life improvement, stress management and behaviour changes. Those who successfully complete the programme are considered for graduation, where they receive certificates and gifts,” Dr Oo told the Sunday Observer. “We admit that there are persons who relapse but, based on the knowledge they have gained while being in the programme, we expect them to know how to manage themselves so as to get back on track.”
In the meantime, while the drug rehab programme is growing in Kingston and Montego Bay, Dr Oo wants its reach to spread to other towns across the island.
“Currently, what we have is still a pilot project and we want it to be regularised in all parishes so that we can get the financial help we need. So far, I believe the programme is growing and I know that if the funding and resources are available it can be successfully expanded to other parishes. I also believe there is need for greater co-ordination between the health and justice ministries,” explained Dr Oo, who sometimes works with the National Council on Drug Abuse (NCDA). “Our vision is also for there to be a substance abuse system in the prisons for the addicts we can’t reach so that when they leave the prisons they can continue the care outside. The continuity of care must be addressed.”
Looking ahead
Meanwhile, AFAFOSA also wants to assist with programmes in schools to dissuade and discourage drug addiction and organise more wide-reaching public education drives. Another of their major projects is the establishment of a new multi-facility rehabilitation centre – an idea still in the planning stages.
“It is one of our major projects that we are thinking of. We are looking into getting sponsorship from abroad and securing the funding,” Ashley explains. “We are also seeking to expand our work nationally into Montego Bay and other towns because this is a national crisis that needs to be dealt with urgently.”
At the same time, the directors argue that more often than not, the addicts they encounter are those who have run-ins with the law and are hauled before the drug court.
“That’s a problem that’s preventing us from being able to reach as many abusers out there as possible,” explained AFAFOSA secretary, Merline Daley, who also serves as a lay magistrate. “We mostly get to deal with the ones who commit crimes against the state and are taken to court. We want to do more. As part of our mission we want to educate and empower the mind so [addicts] can help themselves.”
Meanwhile, Dr Oo believes addicts like those who hang out at ‘The Gulf’ can only get the help they desperately need if they are willing to seek help.
“For some of those persons, we would have to force them and what I have found is that working with people with no motivation makes no sense. It would be almost useless to put them in the programme if they don’t want to,” Dr Oo explained. “So right now we are targeting harm reduction and looking into whether forced treatment will work because many of them on the streets do not know of the harmful effects the drugs can have on them in the long run.”
Commander Preston Ray of the New Kingston Police agreed with Dr Oo, adding that to remove the addicts from ‘The Gulf’ would not be easy.
“Some of them are mentally deranged so if we are to remove them, we would have to do so in collaboration with the relevant agencies. And at the same time we really do not have any place to put them right now,” Ray told the Sunday Observer.