A clinical social worker who has worked extensively with drug addicts has warned that the use of the recreational drug cuts across the board, affecting young and old and all races.
To compound matters, drug users protect their users with all their might.
This was revealed by clinical social worker Ross Antony from SA National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence (SANCA) in Southernwood in KuGompo City.
“It cuts across the board,” Ross Antony said, referencing that it’s not only youngsters that are using it, but rather even professionals dabble.
Antony said the biggest problem grappling society is that people are not informed about drugs.
Once people get to the addict stage, they resist and don’t see themselves as having a problem, and the services of rehabilitation to address the plight are expensive while some of the users are a thorn to the community and their families, involved in crimes for cash to buy the fix, Antony said.
“Some start using drugs at the age of 11. The problem is you are sometimes lured and think you’ll use it once but end up being addicted.
“It’s a big problem.
“It depends on each substance how quickly one gets addicted to a drug.
“The drugs target the brain where you find that it affects the memory.
“It becomes a problem for a child who is in school and the person hallucinates and it leads to disorders like bipolar depending on the biological makeup of a person and how strong they are,” Antony said.
Antony said the users tend to protect where they buy the drugs from, but most cite foreign nationals as their suppliers.
“We work with people who are very economical with the truth. Sometimes one comes in citing one drug and upon testing many other drugs are found in the system.
“It’s everybody’s problem.
“We have professionals that are using it. It’s not just children or certain races,” he said.
Detoxication can take up to 10 days to flush the drugs out of the system, he said, adding this is followed by psychosocial support.
“They protect their suppliers in fear of being harmed because people who sell these things are very dangerous.
“We are aware that such things do exist, but to know who is selling is the difficult part.”
His organisation runs outreach programmes that raise awareness in schools and churches, teach people about the dangers of drugs, and provide training.
“Many people are not aware of substance abuse. Many people end up taking drugs because they are not aware of the drugs. Some people trivialise our job by saying many people have drunk or smoked before and it can’t be detrimental without knowing what each person goes through.
“When we visited areas, we discovered that there is a stigma attached to going to rehab centres and many stereotypes which we try to dispel.
“One of the challenges we are confronted with is parents who associate any mental health disturbance with spiritual calling or bewitchment and they are taken to a traditional healer and they will be charged, while the problem continues and the next step after addiction is death.
“Drugs affect people mentally and they create some sort of problem. You find that they are disturbed.
“We are losing people to this, only to find that a person needs rehab,” he said.
Antony said there was a misconception about rehabilitation centres and “our society is faced with a pandemic when it comes to substance abuse”.
