City tackles drug addiction through harm reduction initiatives
In a bid to tackle drug dependency, eThekwini Municipality has started over 140 people on a drug called methadone - to help those with an addiction to overcome their withdrawal symptoms and cravings.
Programme Manager for Urban Renewal in the city, Dr Soob Moonsammy, has been involved in establishing shelters and marquees across KZN to home homeless people during the lockdown.
One of the shelters separately houses men with drug issues and other health problems.
She says the purpose of this is to prevent them from sharing needles or smokes - that would increase their risk of contracting COVID-19.
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"Bearing in mind that it is a very controversial programme and for the city to show and to actually see the benefits that happened in the lockdown period 5 and 4 set aside one of its buildings on Cliff Avenue referred to as the BellHaven Memorial Hall," she said.
"Here we have NGO's as well as DUT, in particular, the Urban Futures Centre that are running a number of harm reduction initiatives in sort of a needle exchange programme so you don't use the same needle or exchange between different users."
