Ho Chi Minh City has gone ahead in the fight against the abuse of drugs by administering a forceful program to check the health of addicts and send their profile to local courts to decide on a model of detoxification for them.

A notable fact about drug addicts in Vietnam is that many of them are involved in crime and have a low education level.

Seventy percent of snatching and robbery cases in the nation are linked to drug addicts and 80 percent of junkies have a low education level, according to Nguyen Thanh Tai – former deputy chairman of the People’s Committee of Ho Chi Minh City and chief of the drug detox project in the city.

Compulsory detoxification was banned in the country for a year over concerns that it violates human rights.

A pilot program for voluntary drug detoxification followed but was ineffective because most junkies dropped it halfway through.

But the city has begun enforcing a compulsory health-check program on drug addicts since December 5.

The forcible health-check pauses for the first days the fit of addiction before their personal profile is sent to local courts to decide on the mode of detoxification.

By Tet (Vietnam’s Lunar New Year), which will fall in February, the city will have no more drug addicts wandering around the streets to threaten the security of the community, the city’s vice chairman Hua Ngoc Thuan said at a meeting on drug detoxification a few days ago.

Addicts are aggressive

Falling into a fit of addiction, addicts tend to aggressively resist while being gathered at rehabilitation centers for first aid support.

They demolish furniture and property at the centers and even attack health workers when they are in their rush.

Addicts may lose control without drugs during the first days in rehab centers, Le Ba Hoang, director of the Binh Trieu rehab center, said.

It is planned that district-level courts in Ho Chi Minh City will have their first meetings early next month after receiving profiles of drug addicts to decide on the means of detoxification based on the conditions of their family, knowledge, and social status.

In the past few days, city rehab centers have admitted 1,240 drug addicts, and 958 of them have their personal profiles completed. The majority of the addicts have no permanent residency in the city.

Measures to prevent addiction relapse

Drug detoxification at rehabilitation centers is only effective if the inmates do not relapse into addiction after leaving the facilities in the next five to seven years.

Le Thi Bich Ha, from a rehab center in the Central Highlands province of Lam Dong, said that thousands of addicts had been admitted into and left her center, but only a few dozens of them actually stopped using drugs.

The rate of success for addicts who are admitted to a rehab center for the second time has proven low, and it seems that they have inadequate determination to avoid drugs.

When asked if they can get rid of drugs, some addicts replied, “If I’m lucky.”

Those who are successful in detoxifying often have a stable job and happy family after leaving rehab centers, noted Ha. However, the vocational training at rehab centers has proven impractical and ineffective, she added.

After two years in a rehab center, many inmates now spend most of their time knitting or husking cashew nuts, but they cannot survive with these jobs after going back to their family.

Some were trained to sew, repair motorbikes, and work on the electricity grid, or do husbandry, over two or three months, so they do not reach a professional level.

So Ha suggested re-designing the content of vocational training during an addict’s two years in a rehab center.

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