Feb 5, 2013
Drug Abuse and Treatment Centers in Afghanistan
The issue of narcotic drugs production and consumption is worsening in Afghanistan which threatens the security and hinders the development. Afghanistan as the largest opium-producing country in the world produces 94% of the world’s opiates and thus has 920,000 illicit drug users. Ministry of Counter Narcotics (MCN) and many other major organizations such as International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL), UNODC and Colombo Plan aim to eliminate opium and illicit drugs’ cultivation, production, trafficking and addiction in Afghanistan through different programs. As an example, INL has taken actions to decrease drug demand by establishing treatment centers in many provinces of Afghanistan. Specifically, this paper aims to analyze interventions in drug addicts’ lives by Nejat as a male and Sanga Amaj as a female drug treatment center from an ethical point of view. Throughout the intervention, these two centers have overlooked issues related to women, social stigmatization and problems of forced treatment. Despite its deficiencies, intervention by Nejat and Sanga Amaj significantly contributes to drug abusers’ human rights and also the security and development of Afghanistan and thus benefits both individuals and the society.
First of all, Sanga Amaj and Nejat promote the Human Right to Health by providing access to drug treatment and also aiming to decrease and prevent negative health consequences of drug abuse. Right to health is the economic, social and cultural right of everyone to the highest attainable standard of mental and physical health. Sanga Amaj and Nejat help drug users to lead healthy lives by decreasing the “mental and physical health problems,” that drug usage poses to their lives. HIV Aids, Hepatitis B, social exclusion and suicides among drug users are some of the main examples of physical and psychological harms of drug
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