G.F. 323 0003230
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whole. This statement is as true today as it was then. The proposals which follow reflect this requirement, and continue the blend of official, unofficial and voluntary agency endeavour
which has characterised A.C.A.N. in the past.
22.
The second point concerns the treatment of drug addicts. Since World War II a considerable proportion of the development
of treatment and rehabilitation programmes for drug addicts has
come from the Prisons Department. With a substantial majority of
persons sent to gaol being drug dependent, it was and still is primarily in prison that the problems of drug addiction are brought sharply into focus, are unavoidable, and have to be dealt with by a Government Department.
23.
For practical purposes there are only two treatment and rehabilitation programmes for addicts who offer themselves for cure voluntarily those operated by S.A.R.D.A. and the D.P.A.S. both Voluntary Agencies although subvented heavily by Government. Since there is a wealth of difference between compulsory treatment in a penal institution, and treatment to volunteer clients who cannot be disciplined within the system, an almost identical type of approach is not necessarily apposite. And there are several other factors of material difference between what is relevant in a prison context
and what is practicable outside. The Medical and Health Department provides medical officers for the Prisons Department Addiction Treatment Centres, and of recent years has provided a medical officer on secondment for the S.A.R.D.A. Treatment Centre at Shek Kwu Chau. It is at present engaged in operating a most important methadone maintenance pilot project. This, together with its membership of A.C.A.N. is the extent of the Medical and Health Department's participation in the treatment and rehabilitation of drug addicts
at present.
24.
The Prisons Department will continue to be heavily committed to programmes aimed at the treatment and rehabilitation
f drug addicts in its care, perhaps increasingly so, and these programmes will be tailored to take full advantage of the circum- stances of compulsory confinement. However, having regard to the
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