KUALA LUMPUR: The current policy of choosing to incarcerate drug users and addicts for treatment and rehabilitation is one reason offenders are being re-sentenced for the same crime.
Private Detok Limited Dr. Otaiba Qamarul Zaman, a medical expert and a member of the World Commission on Drug Policy, stated that drug users and people addicted to illegal drugs are being punished and imprisoned instead of receiving treatment.
The president and chancellor of Monash University has called on the government to distinguish between drug offenses and drug trafficking and to place people addicted to illegal drugs under the supervision of health workers rather than prisons and police officers.
“Prisoning them doesn’t stop them from kicking their addiction, it just keeps them off drugs for a while.
“But the cravings and biological changes caused by addiction to opioids or amphetamine-type stimulants (ATS), especially if they are chronically addicted, cannot be eradicated by incarceration alone.
“Because of this approach, we are seeing high recidivism rates among those who have been sent to prison,” he said in his keynote address at the Malaysia Symposium on Addiction and Forensic Psychology.
Commenting further, Dr. Adiba said that a study conducted a few years ago showed that drug-related offenders were more likely to reoffend after being released than those who were convicted.
He said ex-addicts at the Drug Addiction Rehabilitation Centers (PUSPEN) under the National Anti-Drug Agency (AADK) are also committing crimes at a faster rate than those receiving community treatment through Cure-End. Attention Clinic (C&C).
“According to the study, the average time to relapse for addicts on PUSPEN is 31 days compared to 352 days on C&C.
“This means that among opioid users and addicts, C&C therapy has an 81 percent reduction in the risk of relapse compared to Bizin,” he said.
As a result of the investigation carried out in Kajang Prison, Dr. Otaiba said that the current system of imprisoning drug addicts has led to overcrowding in prisons and an increase in hepatitis C, tuberculosis, HIV and mental illness. The last 15 years.
He said it would cost the government more to treat and rehabilitate them through C&C clinics rather than keep them in jails or prisons.
“It costs the government 20,690 ringgit a year to jail drug addicts, but in PUSPEN it costs 38,530 ringgit a year.
“Methadone treatment in public facilities costs only RM6,560 per year; buprenorphine treatment (in private facilities) costs RM14,600 per year; and the government spends only RM5,340 on community treatment.
“Treatment in the community is four times cheaper than jailing offenders, not to mention effective drug treatment and prevention in prison,” he said.
