Heroin addiction spreads in Russia at the speed of a forest fire
In recent years, the relative unawareness of Russians about the danger of this drug, against the backdrop of an influx of heroin from Afghanistan, has led to enormous casualties, especially among young people. After the invasion of Afghanistan by US-led international coalition forces, a sharp increase in opium poppy cultivation was recorded in that country, and heroin flooded into Russia through Tajikistan and other Central Asian countries. In Soviet times, drugs were practically non-existent here, reports Los Angeles Times correspondent Megan Stack, and therefore the country was unprepared for such a turn of events.
The “confused actions of the authorities” also do not help improve the situation. Rehabilitation programs for drug addicts are not widespread in Russia, and the drug “Methadone,” which is used for their treatment in the West, is completely banned. In Russian private clinics, a wide range of “experimental methods” are practiced, including shock therapy and “removal of part of the brain,” the journalist recounts. At the same time, Moscow tries to shift the blame for the “epidemic” sweeping the country onto other countries.
US efforts to eradicate poppy in Afghanistan have been largely unsuccessful, prompting Russian officials to accuse Washington of “indifference” on the issue. They have appealed to the UN demanding that the foreign contingent on Afghan territory be obliged to destroy the dangerous crops.
According to official US statistics, 83 people die daily from heroin overdose in Russia, and the country has taken first place worldwide in the consumption of this hard drug. The head of the Federal Drug Control Service, Viktor Ivanov, made a terrifying forecast: “If the situation in Afghanistan does not change, in five to ten years every tenth Russian family will have a drug addict.” Despite the fact that heroin production in Afghanistan has been declining since 2007, its consumption in Russia continues to rise.
Treatment at one of the private narcology centers near Moscow, which the American journalist visited, is not cheap—a thousand dollars a month. Elena Krylova, the program director, notes a sharp increase in the number of drug addicts in the last five years, as well as the emergence of a new social type of patient: “Spoiled boys and girls who simply got bored with their lives.” She emphasizes that these are children from very affluent families.
Statistics show that nearly 9 out of 10 patients go back on the needle within a year after leaving the drug clinic.
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