At least the needle is new…
One of the places we visited was two sewer drains under the main road where several of the addicts slept. Interestingly these were located literally under the Anti Narcotics Force head office! One sewer was dedicated to bachelors; one guy had been here over 2 years. Fortunately the overhead water mains had a leak so there was clean running water.
The other sewer was for families. I saw one woman there and her brother
An interesting fact was that every single drug user had his legs and arms covered in identical scars.
"How did you get them?" I asked one.
"Oh that's when I was last arrested" he replied
"What the police cut you?" I asked in shock
"No I did it myself. The police hate cleaning up the blood and mess, and it can get them into trouble so they let me go" the addict said proudly.
The others all agreed and happily showed me their scars.
"Don't the police search you for knives?" I asked.
"Oh yes, but I hide a razor blade under my tongue, and wait till they are not watching"
Not everyone had mastered the skill of hiding razor blades under their tongue so I'm sure they were shared. Clearly you need to think beyond just teaching people not to share needles when injecting to protect them from HIV!
All these guys (and some women) want is a chance to come to DOST to be treated for heroin addiction. Fortunately I have managed to persuade the Americans to generously donate to DOST so now wehave opened a new 60 bed treatment centre which is now in operation so there is some hope for them. Not everyone manages to recover, and many relapse, but there are some good stories.
Amjad
Our Street child outreach worker, Sharhid found Amjad sleeping on the streets. He is 14 and has been addicted to heroin for 3 years since he claims someone gave him an opium cigarette. He left his home in the small village of Dargi about 70 miles away to come to Peshawar looking for drugs. After repeated visits Sharhid gained the boys trust and convinced Amjad to come to DOST for treatment. After 50 days at our centre he had come off drugs and had started rebuilding his life. Sharhid took him back to Dargi to reunite him with his parents who were overjoyed and had thought he had been kidnapped or murdered.
The long term will still be difficult for Amjad and his family and they will need support to fight drugs, fortunately for Amjad we are in the process of establishing a pilot community drug centre in a mosque in Dargi and will be teaching religious leaders how to mobilise their community against drugs, and how to support the families of people like Amjad in their struggle with the disease.
