Thursday, June 24, 2010
(AP Photo: Julie Jacobson)
American efforts to curb the drug trade in Afghanistan appear to be failing, based on a new United Nations report on addiction levels in the country.
According to a study by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, 8% of Afghan adults are addicted to some kind of drug, including almost 2% who were using opium or heroin. This level is twice the average found through the rest of the world.
The number of regular opium users has jumped 53%—and the number of heroin users has skyrocketed 140%—since the last survey four years earlier.
UN officials attribute the rise in drug use to the expanded availability of cheap opium and heroin in Afghanistan. Despite U.S. efforts to move Afghans away from growing poppies, such fields have become more productive. Also, drug merchants are refining the plant into opium and heroin within Afghanistan’s borders, something that used to take place in other countries.
UN officials attribute the rise in drug use to the expanded availability of cheap opium and heroin in Afghanistan. Despite U.S. efforts to move Afghans away from growing poppies, such fields have become more productive. Also, drug merchants are refining the plant into opium and heroin within Afghanistan’s borders, something that used to take place in other countries.
About 90% of poppy cultivation occurs in the southern provinces, including Helmand and Kandahar, a region that is key to the U.S. war effort against the Taliban.
Ninety percent of Afghan drug users said they needed help with their addiction, but only ten percent were actually receiving treatment.
-Noel Brinkerhoff
Why Has Drug Use Increased So Dramatically In Afghanistan? (by Charles Recknagel, Radio Free Europe)
Drug Use in Afghanistan: 2009 Survey Executive Summary (United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime) (pdf)
Comments