KAJANG - Authorities detected 123,139 drug addicts with estimated of at least 492,556 people still at large, based on the 2022 Drug Addiction Prevalence Study.
Home Minister Datuk Seri Hamzah Zainudin said the study hypothesised that for every abuser and drug addict detected by the authorities, there were four more drug users who were still free.
However, the estimation made by the prevalence study is lower compared to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime estimation where for every drug addict or abuser detected, there were eight people undetected by the authorities.
Apart from that, Hamzah said the recent pattern of drug abuse had shifted from the use of organic drugs to synthetic drugs and the problem of drug addiction was increasing.
"The recent pattern of drug abuse has also been found to have shifted from organic drugs to synthetic drugs. The use of synthetic drugs covers 69.8 per cent of the total number of abusers and drug addicts.
"What’s more worrying is youth group between the ages of 19 and 39 were found as drug abusers and addicts, and the problem of drug addiction is also increasing.
"It’s (a) complex and challenging (problem) to treat, especially those involving dual diagnosis cases, for example like those who have been confirmed addicted to drugs and at the same time have mental illness problems," he said at the launch of Mobile Recovery Treatment (MRT) service at the National Anti-Drug Agency (Nada) headquarters.
The MRT programme provided treatment and rehabilitation for specific groups who have constraints to obtaining drug treatment and rehabilitation at Nada facilities.
The service would be provided out of Nada’s premises and would be implemented by the Nada MRT Team at 14 of the agency’s state offices nationwide.
"I congratulate AADK on the launching of the programme. Previously, we waited for the clients to come to us but now we can provide services to their place instead.
"I am confident that Nada’s MRT which offers mobile services and a community-based approach will be easily accessible to the community because the program offered is more flexible, where the treatment and rehabilitation package will be tailored according to the client's needs," he said.
Hamzah said the MRT service would also be implemented for clients in Nada’s institutions who needed specific intervention sessions through the team’s expertise such as cases of suicide attempts, reluctance and resistance to rehabilitation treatment at the agency’s premises.
The MRT pilot project had previously been implemented for inmates struggling with drug addiction in 2021 in a collaboration with Malaysian Prisons Department.
It was used as a problem-solving approach to overcome the problem of relapse among prisoners and also to increase their compliance rate to attend the Nada’s Community Addiction Treatment and Rehabilitation Program after their release.
Hamzah also stated the concept with the tagline "Nada to You" will further increase access to voluntary drug treatment and rehabilitation in the country.
Also present during the launch were Nada Director-General Sutekno Ahmad Belon, Home Ministry Secretary-General Datuk Wan Ahmad Dahlan Abdul Aziz and Federal Police Narcotics Criminal Investigation Director Datuk Ayob Khan Mydin Pitchay.
Nada had implemented the programme based on its i-Pulih model which offered two programmes – the Community Drug Addiction Treatment and Rehabilitation Program, operated by 109 district offices and the Treatment Program and Institutional Drug Addiction Rehabilitation conducted at 30 Narcotics Addiction Rehabilitation Centers nationwide.
In 2021, Nada clients in the community amounted to 73,113 people and in institutions amounted to 7,133 people. Each year, an average of about 15,000 clients completed the process of recovering from their addiction.
However, the client's recovery rate was only around 65 per cent with an estimated 5,877 clients went into relapse.
Several factors had been identified that cause these addicts to relapse, including lack of family attention and support, society’s skewed view of ex-addicts, the attitude of the individual himself and the influence of friends.