COVID-19: Recovering addicts more at risk of relapse

Tuensang District Users Network team. (Photo Courtesy: Moses Hongang Chang)

 

Moses Hongang Chang

Tuensang

 

Although it has been few weeks since local and state governments in India started taking drastic measures to limit the spread of the coronavirus, there is a high chance of relapses or near-relapses as people experience more urges and cravings to use drugs. Coronavirus is a global crisis, but it will cause the foremost suffering for the recovering addicts.

 

According to Changsang Ongbou, General Secretary, Tuensang District Users Network (TDUN), there are many cases of relapses initially because the users mix the drugs with the OST treatment and other illegal drugs. But, slowly with the gradual intake of OST, the user is in a position to subdue his need for other drugs.

 

Ongbou, who is a recovering addict, first came into contact with illegal drugs in 2003. He could not finish his education, lost many friends and lost the trust of his family. He started taking OST treatment in 2013 with an initial intake of 12mg but today he has been able to curtail to 4mg. By the next two years, he is going to be fully clean.

 

The TDUN is spearheading the user’s community and creating awareness in several educational institutions and other social gatherings about substance abuse. Many recovering users like him share their testimonies to encourage people from avoiding the drugs unless prescribed by doctors for illness.

People who use opioids at high doses medically face challenges to their respiratory health. Since opioids act within the brainstem to slow breathing, their use not only puts the user in danger of life-threatening or fatal overdose, it's going to also cause a harmful decrease in oxygen in the blood (hypoxemia). Lack of oxygen is often especially damaging to the brain; while brain cells can withstand short periods of low oxygen, they will suffer damage when this state persists. The chronic respiratory disorder is already known to extend overdose mortality risk among people taking opioids, and thus diminished lung capacity from COVID-19 could similarly endanger this population.

 

“Registered users under OST treatment are already in the recovery stage but those unregistered users face an issue thanks to the lockdown. Since bringing in even the basic commodities to our town is incredibly difficult. So, nowadays there’s no other drug available for those users in Tuensang town,” stated Ongbou.

 

“Police have done their job in seizing the illegal drugs and thus, the sole option left for them is to register them for the OST treatment but because of the lockdown, the registration was closed. But I spoke with Joint Director, NSACS and therefore the registration for new users made open,” he added.

 

Recently, the Tuensang police force conducted a drug raid and seized 8064 Spasmo-Proxyvon capsules, 2904 Alprazolam tablets and 40 Codeine syrups in Tuensang on 16th April. The SP office, Tuensang informed that school-going dropouts/students or youths take drugs which is harmful to the health. Citing that curbing drug menace is one of their foremost priorities and that they will keep fighting to safe Tuensang from drugs. The case is registered u/s 22c NDPS Act and 13 DC Act. In this regard, the restricted drugs which are under Schedule H must be maintained properly by the proprietors.

 

“There is a stigma on us users ever since we are able to remember. We have been humiliated, discriminated, disowned, looked down by the society and own families. This addiction is but a disease, and each sick person should be taken care with love and affection as any other sick person. Instead, we are being put behind bars, locked up in police custody, beaten up etc. We also understand peddlers usher in the drugs for his or her livelihood that we have got no issues but the treatment administrated to them must not be identical for the users. The law and order will make sure of it but the question is without peddlers there'll be no users,” stated Ongbou.

 

“What I have learnt from attending meetings and conference of All India Users Network or Nagaland Users Network, is that only through love, care, support from community and family a user can change not through torturing or beating up. The only things we raise ask for love and care of the community,” he added.

 

Since, the 70s and 80s, the Tuensang has been under the drug influence but this is the first time that users have a step forward to fight the drug menace, to support community and to make Tuensang district drug free.

 

He went on to say that, “A few years back my members of the family lost complete trust over me and began to neglect me in everything. Be it, higher cognitive process within the family or discussions, they hid everything from me. But after 3-4 years of OST treatment, the support of my family and giving me a second chance, slowly but gradually they have begun to entrust me with family responsibility.”

 

Many of my friends are still struggling to beat this addiction and I encourage them to join our users’ network but the embarrassment of people ridiculing them once they're exposed to society as drug users as they undergo OST treatment hinders them from coming forward.

 

I have a child studying in class 5 who tells me, “Dad, people say you're the secretary of drug users.” I feel so sad and embarrassed because I do know that somebody is discriminating and being looked down upon my child.

 

Drug abuse is a serious issue affecting all sections of the society, irrespective whether or not they are young/old, poor/rich, and educated/illiterate. Only a few among us are able to understand and realize what harm drug addicts do to their families and to themselves by consuming narcotics. There are many reasons responsible for addiction - social or family problems, unemployment, peer pressure etc. They indulged in these activities thinking that they're going to get rid of their worries and depression. They must realize that by consuming drugs, their problems aren't going to decrease but instead they're inviting more problems.

 

The registered OST users in Tuensang are being given their daily doses from our centre and civil hospital,” stated N James Chang, Director, Integrated Development Society, Tuensang.

 

When someone who has been taking it for 10-15 years is suddenly put into an OST treatment, in the first few months of the treatment the user sometimes mixes it since the kick of the drug is different. Although they undergo such treatments to give up their habits the willpower of users are weak initially.

“The police have the responsibility of controlling it but on the part of the punishment if the person could be a user and not a peddler he should tend an option whether he/she is willing to go for an OST (de-addiction) for correction. Whether or not the person is put into jail it's useless if the user isn’t corrected. So, the police should differentiate between the peddlers and users,” he added.