Action way in the issue of drugs,
addiction and challenges
· Caritas-Egypt has been committed to work in the field of fight against drugs and addiction to them since 1981. This commitment was supported by Caritas-Freiburg that pushed to implement this action which requires effort, principle and cooperation with concerned parties in the Egyptian society.
· The problem of drugs and addiction to them has motives and interests on international and social levels.
· I indicate hereby some pivot points to face this phenomenon. Despite all good intentions, action to face this phenomenon requires conjugation of all efforts.
1) The volume of drugs problem and increased production on international and local levels
There are assiduous international efforts to fight against drugs due to negative multiple effects of this phenomenon. Most of international reports indicate increasing drugs activities in the world. There is an increased world production and its spread in many countries, in addition to increased volume of crime phenomenon on international, regional and local levels.
All this is due to constant increase of volume of drug substances that groups of producers and smugglers work to spread to achieve gain. We indicate this increase according to the recent reports of the United Nations on international, regional and local levels.
On international level:
Reports issued from the international authority of drugs control during last years indicate an increase of international production of drugs and illegal substances. Production of opium is estimated to be 7000 tons, cocaine 865 tons, hashish 6000 tons, amphetamines 4000 tons, ecstasy 90 tons. Their consumption and dangers increased in an anxious way in most of world's countries. Total estimations of addicts on world level reached up to 200 million people, representing 4.8 % of world population, most of whom are youth aged from 15 – 74 years, among whom:
· More than 162 million people take hashish and marijuana
· 35 millions take amphitamines and ecstasy
· 16 millions take opium and heroin
· 13 millions take cocaine.
The estimated value of drugs trade in the world is 322 billion $, which shows that the problem of drugs and addiction still represents a great danger for human beings in various countries of the world and its continents, whether rich or poor. It also threatens many world's achievements and leads to more regression of poor societies.
We indicate herewith main world production areas of drug substances:
1) Opium group:
It is planted and its derivatives are extracted in many areas of the world, among which the most important are:
Golden triangle area (Myanmar, Laos, Thailand), Golden Crescent area (Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran) and Mexico.
2) Cocaine group:
Produced from Coca plant that is planted in wide areas at Andes mountains plains that are extended along west coast of South America. It is also planted in Amazon basin and some shore plains on the Atlantic Ocean.
Peru, Bolivia and Columbia are the three greatest producers of cocaine in the world.
3) Cannabis group:
It includes cannabis plant and its derivatives. They are leaves and flowers of dry hashish (marijuana), as well as rating hashish and hashish powder. Cannabis is planted in various areas of Morocco, Nigeria, Ghana, Zaire and Zambia.
4) Creative drugs:
These substances are produced in chemistry laboratories in the form of pills, capsules, powder or liquid. They are mostly produced in European countries and are abused in countries of eastern Mediterranean, especially in Cyprus and Syria, as well as in some Arab countries, like Egypt and Saudi Arabia. They are smuggled in many ways because they are similar to legal medicines. Consequently, they are smuggled by sea, roads or air, with passengers or merchandise.
On regional level:
Drugs phenomenon started to increase in the Middle East in the last period. This is shown by increased volume of produced hashish in countries of northern Africa and some countries of western Africa. There are plantations of cannabis from which are produced hashish and rating hashish in Morocco, Lebanon and some far areas in Sinai.
On local level:
Reports of general administration of fight against drugs and statistics of recent ceased substances indicate the following:
· The country is exposed, due to its geographic position, to trying to bring drug substances through legal terminals, terrestrial frontiers and coasts, especially hashish.
· World production of drug substances, especially stupefying drugs and those affecting psychic status, increased. The same applies on opium after increasing plantations of this substance in Afghanistan, which increased smuggling activities in the country.
· Continued spread of illegal substances of cannabis and opium with more dangerous and complicated dimensions by planting in difficult access areas, with increased possibility of using violence against fighting forces.
· Increased contraventions of some pharmaceutical companies and pharmacies in dealing with drugs and substances affecting psychic status and spread of their abuse.
· Political and security instability and spread of violence in some producing neighboring countries threaten of appearing new forms of the problem represented by facing new methods of smuggling and addiction.
· Increased threats of organized crime worldwide and its relation with many dangerous crime activities, and their traditional relation with activities of drugs, money bleaching and corruption, which leads to increased volume of the phenomenon.
· Increased dangers of misusing Internet in spreading culture of addiction and consumption of drugs leading to the same previous results.
· All this leads to increasing the volume of the phenomenon in the Egyptian society and spreading its negative effects on social, economic and security level, which requires multiplying efforts in this issue.
2) Negative effects of drugs phenomenon on the Egyptian society on social, security, economic levels
1- Social effects of drugs phenomenon:
Drugs consumption and addiction are a dangerous social problem that threatens the society and its security. This is not limited only to the Egyptian society, but it became a great danger for all human societies. Its effects are reflected on the society from various political, economic, social and health aspects.
Drugs are an evil that affects the individual, a tragedy for his family and a real loss for his country. Addiction has the worst results on the individual in his will, work and social status. By the effect of drugs, he becomes a person unable to perform his normal duties.
Addict, with what he spends on drugs, deducts a great part of income of the family. Therefore, he represents a great economic burden on it. By deducing this part of income, life condition of the family is affected, and he is unable to fulfill essential needs of family's members, which push sons to make some illegal actions, like mendacity, theft, prostitution. They are all social diseases affecting the individual, the family and the society. The addict who spends his money on drugs is not aware of his responsibility as a tutor of the family. He is a bad model. Consequently, children grow without any awareness of their responsibility towards their families and societies in the future.
This is a danger for the society when its members grow with trends and negative attitude towards the society. In the family of the addict there is always tension, divergences and disputes between its members. Researches and studies showed increasing rates of bad relations between couples, permanent conflict between them and their separation in families where there are drug addicts. Consequently, there is increasing rate of troubles among children in these families. Minors are pushed to addiction and deviation. Therefore, addiction of members of the family becomes a series of consecutive chains non dissociated, which leads to total destruction of the family, and consequently of the society. By revising juridical files in many family courts, it has been shown that hundreds of trials in which the wife asks for divorce due inability of the husband to fulfill his duties as family tutor, father and husband, most of these husbands are addicts. Their physical power has been weakened and they need support after they lost their initial source of income or their wealth, and what they owe is not sufficient to fulfill essential needs of the family. This husband becomes evil and miserable. He lives of theft. Ties between members of the family are ruptured and joy is destroyed. The worst evil committed by the father towards his sons is caused by addiction to drugs.
Addiction to drugs is also considered as a direct reason for hatred between people, even between friends, because when the addict consumes drugs and looses his mind that forbids words and actions harming people, he is pick pocketed by love of false vanity and becomes easily dominated by anger, which pushes him to hatred and animosity, many quarrels with people, leading to murder, beating, stealing, revealing secrets, violation, treason of governments and homelands. These are social diseases affecting the society.
At the end, we can say that spread of drugs caused many social diseases like corruption, theft, moral deviations, public disorders, through violence, harshness, damaging properties, treason and other diseases that are spread in the society which falls victim of addiction without entity, becoming a society with no awareness or creativity.
2- Security effects of drug addiction phenomenon:
Consumption of drugs leads to great harm for individuals and society. It leads to many crimes against oneself and others. The addict always violates law. Addicts are an easy target in the field of crime like prostitution, drug smuggling, and theft. Drug smugglers exploit them to help in their trade. They are therefore displaced from the phase of addiction to a more dangerous and criminal phase.
Thus, we see that addiction is not only a crime per se, but it causes many other crimes. We do not imagine that there is a danger that threatens security and stability of any society and endangers its future like drugs, because they spread diseases and corruption, they kill energies of productive activity, paralyze the movement of creative thought, and push the society to regression and loss.
Considering addiction as a criminal phenomenon and an sickness phenomenon at the same time is a correct vision supported by all moral dimensions. The addict attacks himself, destroys his mind and capacities and deprives the society of them. He terrifies people, spreads evil and commits harmful actions. All these are forbidden behaviors according to the law. Therefore, he is a criminal against himself, his family and his society. All this affects the society in which he lives. This is extremely harmful for this society.
Prevention of the society against the problem of addiction to drugs is prevention against many crimes. Many crime statistics conducted in various countries, including Egypt, showed that crimes committed by criminals under the effect of drugs are mostly crimes of violence and aggression against persons, immoral crimes, negligence, felony, unintentional murder, unintentional wounding due to car crashes caused by driving under the effect of drugs.
3- Economic effects of drug addiction phenomenon:
Drugs destroy the body and also the money, whether it is the money of an individual or that of a society. They destroy homes; make children orphans and living in poverty, misery and deprivation. Drugs bring addicts unconsciously to strongboxes of traders of poisons and international criminals.
The individual who takes drugs is obliged to deduce a great part of his income to purchase this substance. His financial conditions worsen.
Drugs are causing rising rates of some currencies. They are collected by traders to purchase drugs. They also have harmful effects on health rendering the individual less productive. By them, the state looses a part of its best youth who are led to madness or death. It is a great loss for the national economy whose repercussions are bared by the whole nation, which leads to deterioration, weakness and sickness.
The matter is not limited to decreased productivity of the addict in his work, but the productivity of the society is also decreased, and efforts of development are reduced consequently due to the following reasons:
· Spread of drug addiction leads to increase of members of the police, prisons, courts, prefecture, and hospital employees. If there was no phenomenon of addiction, those people could go to places more productive, healthy or cultural, instead of chasing criminals, drugs smugglers and addicts and judge them, treat addicts and rehabilitate them.
· Drug addiction represents a great burden for national income. There is an economic loss represented by costs of people working in care and fight against the problem and enormous expenses for prevention, treatment, fight and institutions created on this purpose, as well as in processes for condemned in crimes of drugs in prisons and hospitals. These expenses could be oriented, if addiction was not spread, to increasing productivity of the society, efforts of economic and social development, giving incentives to people supervising their treatment. We must be aware that fight against drug became necessary as many countries feel the danger of the crime for the nation and the threat for entity of the society; especially that security and stability are two world requirements of all countries of various cultures. The crime has a direct effect on insecurity and instability of individual and society.
· The amount spent on drugs is huge. If drugs are planted in the society that consumes them, this means loss of a part of the national wealth represented by lands that could be exploited by useful agriculture and human efforts that are lost in planting drugs. If the society consumes drugs, great sums get out from it in the form of smuggled foreign currency, smuggled merchandise and fighting operations. These sums could be exploited in importing machines for production, education or health, or spent on improving our material, social and economic conditions.
· Many researches were conducted in Egypt on amounts that are spent on the problem of drugs. They all mentioned astronomic numbers that, if they are true, will have a great impact on the Egyptian economy.
3) The national strategy to face the problem of drugs in Egypt
Introduction:
The Ministry of Interior gives a great importance to the problem of drugs. Although the Ministry is concerned with fight against offer, through policies and studied plans executed by many authorities, especially the general administration of fight against drugs, in total coordination with various concerned authorities of state sectors, especially our army forces, customs house, authorities of the Ministry of Health concerned with pharmaceutical affairs. It does not spare any effort to reduce the demand, in total coordination with all concerned authorities, especially in sensitization. In June 2008, the National Council for fight and treatment of addiction announced issuing the most recent development of the national strategy for fight and treating addiction, examining dimensions to be developed and adding to them according to new evolutions in the outside surrounding and changes that occurred in the phenomenon, suggesting mechanisms, programs and plans that the national strategy of fight against addiction seeks to achieve.
Parties and institutions assuming implementation of confrontation strategy:
· Ministry of Interior represented by the general administration of fight against drugs
· Ministry of Defense "Air Forces – Frontiers-Guards"
· Ministry of Finances "Customs House"
· Ministry of Health "Central administration of pharmaceutical affairs"
· Ministry of Justice.
· Ministry of Family & Population represented by the Fund of fight & treatment of addiction
· Ministry of Local administration, governorates & popular councils
· Ministry of Information.
· Ministry of Agriculture
· The Social Fund for development
· Civil society "institutions of volunteer action".
Policies adopted by the Ministry of Interior that are executed by the general administration of fight against drugs are based on several main axis:
1st axis: Facing importing and smuggling:
The Ministry is keen to support efforts for confrontation of main smuggling lines through frontiers and coasts, of all types of drug substances and chemicals, by reinforcing frontiers, coasts and their branches in terminals and ports, with human and material potentials, especially bodies of technical assistance and inspection, proper means of transport, with intensifying investigations on lines and areas of smuggling, as well as smugglers, types of drugs targeted to be smuggled in the country, filling gaps, consolidating far sites to face exploiting by smugglers of far and desert areas, and borders areas, by reinforcing international cooperation with neighboring countries and international fight authorities.
2nd axis: Fighting against drug substances plantation:
Continuing follow up of security situation in areas of drug substances plantations, orienting efficient security campaigns to these areas in order to eliminate these plantations, arrest those who plant them, avoid repeating these plantations, imposing control on main roads and paths in production areas, and continuing coordination and cooperation with the Ministry of Defense (Frontiers-Guards – Air Forces) to implement participation to campaigns of eradication, and intensifying exploration and parachutes operations. Notice that the Ministry of Interior, in coordination with the Ministry of Defense, conducted four major campaigns of 7 days each to eradicate drug substances plantations in Sinai. The Ministry also conducted several one-day campaigns all along the year in Sinai, and organized inspection campaigns in areas of eventual illegal plantation activity in the country.
3rd axis: Confronting public trade and focuses:
The Ministry is keen to confront criminal focuses and public addiction in various areas of the country whose negative effects are reflected on efforts of fighting bodies among public opinion, through intensifying investigations to detect and identify elements committing these crimes, and orient huge campaigns to eliminate them, intensifying security presence and follow up to forbid their return to their activity, arresting escaped elements, facing abuse of medicines affecting psychic status, and trade made by some pharmacists of needs of patients, which really represent the future danger.
4th axis: Fight against addiction and reducing demand:
The Ministry of Interior, although it is concerned with fighting against offer, through forbidding production of drugs, their smuggling and trade, and its clear success in this field, does not spare any effort to reduce the demand of drugs and participate to establishing the global national strategy to face the problem of drugs announced in June 2008. It is also keen to avoid that anyone enters in the circle of addiction, with special care for the categories of youth and students.
Efforts of the Ministry of Interior are represented through the general administration of fight against addiction in the following:
· Intensifying campaigns to arrest addicts. Providing a direct phone line in the administration (24820001) and its diffusion by media in order to receive calls all along the day, concerning either public trade or addiction.
· Launching campaigns on areas of youth gathering near clubs, summer resorts, cafeterias, university and school students gathering, contravening pharmacies, in coordination with concerned authorities at the Ministry of Health.
· Detecting and following all trials and methods aiming at spreading the culture of desire of drugs among youth, and sensitizing them through publications and publicity.
· Creating a contact department in bodies of reducing demand to reinforce contact channels and coordinate between the administration and those bodies; providing experience and necessary information to sensitization efforts.
· Being committed to coordination and participation with the National Council of fight and treatment of addiction, the Fund of fight and treatment of addiction, the National Council of Childhood and Motherhood, and all bodies concerned with reducing demand, by contributing to all programs of sensitization to dangers of drugs, by all available means, in order to implement efforts of reducing demand.
· Caritas-Egypt has a contact with all concerned authorities and an agreement that is successively renewed with the Fund of fight and treatment of addiction.
Magdy Garas
June 2011
