Now all we have to do is make cannabis legal. What a jolly good idea.
What a shame it’s not possible to get the figures on cocaine use in Malta, because if the number of syringes handed out to heroin-users alone is anything to go by, this is one hell of a drugged-up nation.
The parliamentary secretary for health, Chris ‘Breastfeeding’ Fearne said in parliament tonight that 342,732 syringes were handed out to heroin addicts at state health centres last year. One-third of them – 111,800 – were given out at the Paola Health Centre alone.
I’ll repeat that again: 342,732 syringes were given out to heroin addicts last year. 342,732.
Malta has had for years a policy of distributing free syringes, no questions asked, to heroin addicts. This is done because they would otherwise share needles or use old ones and the incidence of HIV and hepatitis would sky-rocket. The policy has been successful in this respect, but it also gives a reliable indication of the extent of Malta’s heroin problem.
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And not all heroin addicts mainline.
The scaredy-cat ones and ones that can afford greater quantity and or want no track marks usually “chase the dragon”, smoke heroin by heating it up on a piece of aluminum foil and inhaling the fumes.
That’s about 1,000 syringes per day. How many does an addict use on average in a day?
Drug addiction is a problem and the government is determined to make it worse.
Speak of heroin, and you have barely touched any of the other drugs, that are considered more new age and current.
Drugs known as Coke, GHB, ICE, METHADRONE (not methadone, that’s something else)
These drugs are considered new and white collar. We all know that Malta is old fashioned and back ward and even in the regard of drugs, heroin is still widely use, as a drug of choice.
Younger people and people who are usually professionals that stay away from Heroin are using other drugs and this is probably who crowd Joseph want to appease with their cool drug policy.
But considering how undisciplined and messy Maltese can be, the decriminalisation of any drug would spell disaster.
You can find information on drug use in Malta at the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction. In the country overview for Malta (http://www.emcdda.europa.eu/publications/country-overviews/mt), the estimate provided is of close to 2000 high risk drug users (not all would be injecting). The 1000 syringes per day would kind of fit this estimate.
Another interesting bit is that among persons entering drug treatment 29% reported cannabis as being their primary drug and the trend is increasing (28% reported cocaine and 35% heroin). More than half of all clients reported injecting their drug.
The question we should be asking ourselves is whether drug use will now become acceptable, whether decriminalisation will increase drug use, and who will be winning with this decriminalisation legislation.
Even if 50% of those requests accounted for the total number of individual heroin users, the statistic should still send alarm bells.
Instead we get lectured on breastfeeding.
In any case, drugs are big business and we can now see why decriminalisation is is in discussion – to safeguard the needs of drug barons who are the only ones to stand to gain from the mess.
They sell them on eBay.
You can hardly equate the two (heroin and cannabis).
I thought Simon Busuttil would refrain from Sunday sermons only, and not go on a complete shut down.
Budget deficit spiralling out of control, notwithstanding the proceeds from sale of passports?
Bus service in a total mess; the only foreign bidder is a tiny Spanish company.
No response as to why the hedging if fuel oil was stopped. EneMalta had lost millions with hedging agreements entered in 1996 -1998.
Environmental controls are running amok with development permits galore. The only vision Labour has to enlarge the economy is a construction frenzy.
Power station? Interconnector feed?
The Ombudsman issue over army promotions.
It appears that Dr Muscat has managed to neutralise the Opposition as well.
It is simply incredible that after 25 years in government the PN seems to be comatose just one year into Opposition.
Dr Busuttil, where are you? You still there?
If that’s anything to go by, the vast extent of heroin use goes to show that prohibition is not working. I think it’s high time we dealt with the drug issue head-on.
[Daphne – How do you assess ‘not working’? An absolute absence of heroin addiction is not possible. Nor is an absolute absence of heroin trade. The ban is most definitely working. Without a ban, you would have far more heroin addicts and not fewer. Try using some rational thought. ]
Making something illegal rarely works because it precludes the use of a myriad other policies that could be more effective at deterring potential drug users. Labeling drug users as criminals or putting them behind bars is not only unjust (why should you punish someone for harming themselves?) but also unwise (if you don’t have a criminal mind, then prison is the sure place to get one).
Ahem… what does this have to do with cannabis and/or cocaine?
What strikes me much more, thinking about the massive amount of syringes, is that it seems like someone (in the supply chain or as a ‘customer’) has found a clever way to make money. It seems really hard to believe that there is a need for a thousand sysringes PER DAY in the illegal Maltese heroin scene.
I believe there are about 1000 patients who visit the detox centre every day. Most of them still use heroin even though they are in methadone, so the number if syringes being distributed makes sense.
At approximately €20 a shot, that’s nearly €7 million, and that’s only a small part of the market.