Closing of Care Drugs Awareness Month (June-July) |16 July 2016

Care expresses concern over drug issue in Seychelles

As the Care Drugs Awareness Month comes to a close, chairperson Sarah Zarqani Rene has sent a special message which reads:

“As we close the Care Drugs Awareness Month, a month of more intense activities at mainly school level, which coincided with the International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit trafficking, Care wishes to make known its concerns about the drug issue in our country.

“It is a well established fact that addiction is one of the most difficult conditions to treat successfully, mainly because of its extremely complex nature, which is why it is getting more recognised the world over, that the best way to fight the drug scourge is through demand reduction, which put simply, is to educate and strengthen our children and youth to a high degree, where they would be able to resist the lure of substance use/abuse.

This is Care’s fight as the main and indeed, the only full time prevention organisation in the country. Despite all our tireless efforts we continue to see too many young lives fall prey to this scourge.

“Numerous studies have shown that there are many risk factors that increase the risk of children falling into substance abuse and other anti-social behaviour, most important of which are: the lack of a strong, nurturing, loving but disciplined family environment with strong parent child bonds, failure at school, and the salient easy accessibility and availability of drugs, coupled with a perception that society does not very strongly condemn the use of drugs.

“Unfortunately, it does not take a wise man or a clairvoyant to notice that all three factors are increasing at a fast rate in our society, with the disintegration and degeneration of families, increase in failure rates at school, coupled with a growing disinterest with the desire to learn and succeed, and most important of all, a constant increase in the availability of drugs on every street corner.  Care is very concerned that the amendment to the Misuse of Drugs Act will greatly increase this risk by not only making cannabis more accessible but also by changing perceptions to drug use making it a more acceptable habit.

“Numerous scientific studies have shown clearly that cannabis is not a harmless drug as it affects the memory, cognitive ability, judgment, thinking, concentration, motivation and our five senses in very detrimental ways.  It is also a gateway drug and a stepping stone to other harder drugs as 99% of heroin and cocaine addicts started off with cannabis.  More cannabis around means more heroin addicts.

“A national disaster is unfolding right before our very eyes, and before it is too late we call upon all players, especially the government, to do much more to reduce at least two main risk factors, namely, the availability of drugs on our streets and to put well thought out strategies to strengthen our families and train our parents.  The younger generation is counting on us to save them.”