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The war on drugs in Zimbabwe has shifted to new and higher levels as more active measures are taken to cut supply chains and offer addicts more effective and obtainable treatment.
The attack on the supply chains has seen the Medicines Control Authority of Zimbabwe moving from being largely a regulator to taking on a far greater role in enforcement, cancelling the licences of wholesalers and individuals in the pharmaceutical sector who were selling banned addictive medicines or were selling prescription drugs that can only be used under medical supervision as over the counter products for abuse.
The supply of illegal drugs has been growing rapidly for the past 15 years since US dollars started circulating in large numbers in Zimbabwe, first with dollarisation and even know with the multi-currency economy.
When almost all trade within Zimbabwe was done with Rhodesian and then Zimbabwean dollars criminals were far less keen on selling drugs to new users in the country, since they could not get their profits out of the country and usually had problems finding the foreign currency to import.
So the Zimbabwean drug problems were largely limited to overuse of alcohol and to mbanje, a home-grown drug. There were some of the fancier imported drugs, but these were largely limited to the very well off, who have never been a large group.
The readily availability of foreign currency in private hands created new markets and these have been exploited by the drug lords.
There are a wide range of problem drugs. While crystal meth has joined mbanje and alcohol as a readily available drug of choice, we are seeing abuse of opiate medications, with large quantities or several banned cough medicines coming into the country.
This is where the active intervention of the Medicines Control Authority of Zimbabwe is having a positive effect, both in drying up non-smuggled medicines and in rounding up those who smuggle in supplies.
There are other opiates that are legal and useful, mainly to combat extreme levels of pain after surgery or when people are afflicted with some very serious illnesses.
These are legal, but can only be administered under medical supervision. In some cases the patients can be treated out of hospital, but still have to go to a proper outpatients clinic for their injections to ensure there is zero abuse. For a couple of these drugs it needs two nurses to open the safe to prevent any abuse.
We have seen ever larger quantities of cocaine being seized at airports, some probably in transit, but other parcels earmarked for our local market, and there are other dangerous drugs that people will be tempted to use if they are available.
The second major change came this week when the Cabinet approved the use of those extra confinement wards set up to treat those infected with Covid-19, but who did not need the intensive care facilities that were also added to the public health system.
This will help treat the more serious addicts who have been overloading psychiatric wards, or who have been left with their families without adequate support.
It is unfortunate that by the time someone needs to be admitted to a hospital or clinic for drug addiction they are in a rather bad state and do need specialised medical care while they are being “dried out” to use the term common for alcoholism. When it is far easier to treat in the early stages many addicts, or potential addicts do not bother, and it is only when their addiction has become very serious, so serious that they cannot continue in employment or earn their own living, that they seek help, or their families seek help.
These isolation wards could also, since they will have at least one medical professional who knows something about addiction, be useful as outpatient clinics as well, both for the less addicted as well as for the serious addicts once they have been discharged to come in for regular check ups.
There does need to be a distinction between a supplier and a user of drugs. The heaviest law enforcement efforts need to be targeted at suppliers, and the courts need to be willing to impose jail sentences, with these long enough to deter, at this target group.
We need to make it clear that if you deal in drugs you face a very high risk of arrest because the police are hunting you down, followed by a near-certain jail sentence because the courts think you should be out of circulation.
The far larger group of users can he treated differently. For a start better education campaigns can be effective in stopping people from becoming a user, or at least getting users back on to a straighter path once they have done a bit of experimenting. With reasonable luck these users who hurriedly back out of the drug scene will never come to the attention of the authorities.
Those caught in drug raids and other police action can, if first offenders and are clearly not dealing, be treated with some discretion by the police and courts.
Magistrates can be more merciful if for example a user divulges all the details of who sold them the drugs in the first place, and this would also mean testifying in court if necessary, and are prepared to undergo treatment for their drug use, hopefully as an outpatient.
A bit of community service thrown in would not go amiss, just to hammer home the point that drug use is a bad idea and if they are being treated as an outpatient perhaps that service could be in the same medical centre where they would have to report in for a quick check before taking up their brooms and buckets for whatever their work assignment was that day.
Multiple offenders would need a different approach, although these probably must be treated for more serious addiction before their future can be plotted.
Most addicts will never be cured, in the sense that if they relapse they will very rapidly become a serious medical case again.
Here support groups will be needed, modelled perhaps of the very effective Alcoholic Anonymous which has done so much to keep recovering alcoholics off the bottle for the rest of their lives. But AA does require that those they help seek help; the programmes do not work if the person is forced to join.
The Inter-ministerial National Committee that has been coordinating the anti-drug campaign is now being beefed up with permanent staff, with the coordinator being the same public health expert who coordinated the Covid-19 campaign and who has vast experience in the Health and Child Care Ministry and the public health field. Having the campaign backed by full-time medical experts is vital.
Many of those who do not use drugs, and never intend using them, tend to be a bit blasé about the problem. Those who have to deal with the results of drug abuse, and this includes many in public service including the Cabinet, are clearly alarmed and are frightened of the damage that will be done to a lot of citizens and the country unless we defeat the drug lords and fix up their victims.
Drug abuse is one of those public health issues that require us all to be involved, supporting those in our families who might be suffering and at the very least passing on details of any drug activity that comes to our attention.
Online Reporter