Liberal policy leads to drop in new Swiss drug addicts

LONDON (Reuters) – Switzerland’s liberal policy of offering
drug addicts substitution treatments has results in a drop in
the number of new heroin users, according to research published
on Friday.

People taking up the habit dropped 82 percent from 850 in
1990 to 150 in 2002 in the canton of Zurich thanks to policies
such as needle-exchange services and methadone programs.

Dr Carlos Nordt, of the Psychiatric University Hospital in
Zurich, said the declining figures reflect similar trends
throughout the Alpine nation.

“We have seen the number of new heroin users drop very
impressively,” he added.

Critics of the liberal drugs policy have warned that
providing medical treatment with methadone would attract new
users. But Nordt said he found no evidence to support the
argument.

“Heroin seems to have become a ‘loser drug’, with its
attractiveness fading for young people,” he said in a report in
The Lancet medical journal.

Nordt and Rudolf Stohler analyzed information on more than
7,000 patients in Zurich who had substitution treatment with
methadone or buprenorphine to get them off heroin. The research
covers a 13-year period.

While heroin use has risen in other European countries, the
researchers said their results show a decline. But although
fewer people are trying heroin the overall number of addicts
has only declined by four percent. There is also a very low
cessation rate.

“This is a long-long condition for some,” Nordt said,
adding that the overall number of heroin users has remained
more or less stable.