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Post Reporter
THE drug and substance abuse scourge bedevilling society requires collective efforts among different stakeholders to successfully tackle it, a senior Government official has said.
Speaking during a drug awareness campaign organised by Seventh Day Adventist Church and held in the city last Saturday, Secretary for Manicaland Provincial Affairs and Devolution, Mr Edgars Seenza said families, churches and development partners should join hands with Government in promoting public health issues that have serious repercussion on society.
“Let us find the root cause of the problem so that we deal with it in totality. We need to go back to the drawing board because as a society we have disturbed the social fabric and its balance by taking willy-nilly what we eat and drink, even that which was not part of our culture,” said Mr Seenza.
He said stakeholders should interrogate why boys are involved in abusing dangerous substances more than girls in order to come up with inclusive interventions that are effective.
Said Mr Seenza: “Most intervention programmes have tended to put more focus on girls while overlooking boys. This is tantamount to replacing an evil with another evil. We talk about gender balance, but are we walking our talk? It is harmful to exclude the boys because they can actually become more dangerous as this increases their propensity to delinquent behaviour. We must take both girls and boys on board.”
Mr Seenza implored families to play an active role in instilling values that mould responsible citizens.
“If we want to build a peaceful community in Manicaland and the entire country, we should start with the family unit which is the building block of a cohesive and coherent society,” said Mr Seenza.
Drug and substance abuse has become a serious public health concern causing physical, social and emotional harm.
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