Q: It's a tough job for any country to help addicts quit
using drugs. How many drug users are there in China? What damage
does drug addiction cause to the economy and society? What measures
has the government taken to help addicts quit?
A: At the end of 2004, there were 791,000 registered drug users
in China. Their ranks increased considerably as forms of drug use
diversified, with many abusers becoming addicted to more than one
drug. Most addicts are young people, bums and migrants, and of all
registered drug users in China, 72.2 percent are under the age of
35.
The drug situation has seriously damaged the Chinese economy.
The country's registered heroin addicts consume heroin worth 27
billion yuan (US$3.26 billion) every year. The drug problem also
jeopardizes public security, giving rise to drug-related crimes. Of
the entire registered drug addict population, 80 percent of male
users were involved in other illegal activities, while 80 percent
of the females worked as prostitutes. In some areas, drug addicts
are responsible for 60 to 80 percent of robberies and thefts. As
well, the use of narcotics jeopardizes physical and mental health.
For example, 55.3 percent of China's 50,000 confirmed AIDS patients
became infected with HIV through intravenous drug injection.
In any country, drug abuse is always a crucial political problem
to security and prosperity. With this understanding, the Chinese
Government attaches great importance to the rehabilitation of drug
abusers, through compulsory rehabilitation, rehabilitation through
education and labor, and volunteer rehabilitation programs carried
out by health institutions with a focus on education and helping
users to quit drugs and start a new life.
With an aim of enhancing the ability of teenagers to say no to
drugs, the Chinese Government launched drug prevention courses in
primary and middle schools nationwide in 2004. At the same time,
the government initiated several anti-drug education campaigns,
including a pilot program of drug prevention education at 100
middle schools, community-level law schools for teenagers, and a
community-level drug-free campaign for teenagers.
The government carried out its national anti-drug campaign in
depth by unfolding a program of investigation, rehabilitation, help
and education through four main measures.
First, the government worked to strengthen the registration and
supervision of drug users by establishing a supervision system and
adopting the epidemiological method of investigation, supervision
and appraisal of all kinds of addicts.
Second, the government undertook to further the intense drug
rehabilitation work launched nationwide by making all
rehabilitation centers operate at full capacity, striving to
establish more facilities, and devoting special sections in the
existing drug rehabilitation centers to HIV/AIDS-infected addicts
and other special cases.
Third, the government put effort into exploring a variety of
rehabilitation modes, further improving the method of combining
compulsory rehabilitation with rehabilitation through labor,
guiding some local governments to take advantage of available
resources to rehabilitate drug abusers through hard labor, and
promoting a comprehensive technique of closed-door rehabilitation
through a combination of labor and education.
Fourth, to free smaller communities from the shadow of drug
abuse, the government is focusing on counties (cities or districts)
with more than 1,000 drug addicts, tentatively establishing a
system of supervision, control and education of addicts in various
forms, expanding the number of anti-drug volunteers and
strengthening efforts to help and educate addicts in order to
improve rehabilitation success rates.
The Chinese Government has basically realized its goal of
putting all visible drug addicts under control and limiting the
number of new addicts, further alleviating the damage drug abuse
causes to society and helping people realize the importance of an
anti-drug campaign. Currently, with the population of former drug
addicts who have been clean for at least three years reaching
88,000, China's efforts to combat drug use has achieved a certain
effectiveness.