prescription heroin plan

A FEW weeks ago we reported on the recommendations from Halton MEP Chris Davies to introduce heroin for addicts on the NHS.

We asked you for your comments on the matter and received a huge response from readers who supported the views of the MEP.

Chris Davies had called for doctors to be able to prescribe the drug heroin for users up to three times a day, which would be administered in special NHS clinics. By offering a supply of heroin on the NHS, researchers believe that it will help to reduce crime figures and break the link between drug users and dealers following on from studies that took place in Zurich.

Readers were wholly in support of the Euro MP's comments.

One reader, DA Byrne, said: "The steady decrease in the value of all drugs over the past 20 years is an infallible indicator of increasing supply despite some heroic efforts.

"I spent a year working in a night shelter for the homeless after my retirement. Our clients were 50 per cent young, criminally active men. They were addicted to a variety of drugs but all shared one aim in life - how to get their 'fix' for that day by whatever way they could get the necessary cash.

"To prescribe them drugs would not reform them but would remove the enormous value added ingredient of illegality. It would remove the need for them to carry out a daily crime campaign and thus make life far safer for the rest of society."

Meanwhile another reader, Valerie Speed, believes that the idea would help to reduce the number of drug dealers on the streets

She said: "Within the whole scheme of this drugs business industry, to have heroin (and other types of drugs) that are managed, supervised and controlled by the medical authority, rather than left found and being sold to anyone on the street, and under the sole control of drug barons, dealers, criminals and gangsters, is far favourable and a positive healthy step forward."

What do you think? You can write to us with your opinion at Widnes and Runcorn World, The Academy, Bridge Street, Warrington, WA1 2RU.