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Drug programs working: doctor

Programs being offered by hospitals in Tainan City and Tainan County to help heroin addicts kick their habit with methadone substitution have achieved good results, according to a doctor at National Cheng Kung University Hospital.

Wang Yu-ting (王裕庭), who has been treating heroin addicts at a methadone substitution program at Cheng Kung University Hospital, quoted statistics as showing that from last September until February, hospitals in the Tainan area had treated 225 heroin addicts with methadone.

Before joining the programs, 67 percent of the 225 drug abusers had committed criminal offenses, but after receiving the methadone treatment, the criminal recidivism rate dropped to 0.02 percent, Wang said.

He said that the hospital had treated 35 new heroin addicts in the past two months and has found that approximately 70 percent of them have contracted HIV, hepatitis or syphilis -- mostly through the intravenous injection of opiates.

Noting that intravenous injection has replaced sexual contact as the No. 1 cause of HIV transmission in the nation, Wang cited statistics saying that more than 2,000 people in Taiwan contracted HIV in 2005 from using contaminated needles or syringes to inject heroin.

Methadone substitution is a relatively inexpensive method used by many countries to treat opiate addiction.
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