Methadone therapy can slash rehab costs

NST: KUALA LUMPUR: The government can effectively wipe out drug abuse and save about RM270 million annually in the process if it fully implements methadone maintenance therapy (MMT), said Prof Dr Mohamad Hussain Habil.
Hussain, head of the Psychiatry Department at the medical faculty of Universiti Malaya, said MMT also reduced the risk of HIV infection because no needles were used.
The government has spent RM300 million annually on tackling the problem through its zero-tolerance, long-term rehabilitation programme at 26 rehabilitation centres with little or no success.
This cost could be slashed drastically if MMT was used, he said.
Dr Hussain said it cost the government about RM3,000 per month per addict with its rehabilitation system, while the cost with the MMT method was RM300 per patient per month, a savings of 90 per cent.
Further, almost 75 per cent of the addicts who left the rehabilitation centres returned to their old habits within months, he said.
Dr Hussain said a nationwide study by the university in 2005 showed with the MMT method, most heroin-addicted patients gained employment after six months of therapy and did not engage in high-risk behaviour like self-injection or promiscuity.
He estimated there were at present about one million drug addicts in the country, with almost 800,000 addicted to heroin.
The rest were using drugs like Ecstasy, ketamine and ganja.
He said that with the MMT method, addicts were treated as if they were patients requiring medical attention for a disease.
"Drug abuse is just like any other disease like diabetes or hypertension, where long-term drug therapy is required to help the patient."
This contrasts with the situation in the 1990s when heroin addicts were treated like criminals and the general feeling was that they should be ostracised, jailed and condemned.
The criminalisation of heroin dependency caused suffering for addicts and their families and imposed a financial burden on the government.
Dr Hussain said methadone was a drug which helped to reduce cravings for heroin, thereby helping an addict to kick the habit.
"There is no known side-effect from the long-term use of methadone."
He said the university had trained about 1,000 local doctors in the private and public sectors on MMT.
"This makes it easy for heroin addicts to seek treatment from a private clinic nearest their home and still stay with their families."
He was glad the Ministry of Health had started using MMT in its hospitals and hoped that its use would be expanded to benefit dadah addicts and the nation as a whole.