NALTREXONE CLINIC SHUTS, OUT OF MONEY

GEORGE O'NEIL'S naltrexone clinic will be closed for treatment today
after management rejected a State Government offer to act as
guarantors for pharmaceuticals needed for the rapid detoxification
treatment of heroin addicts.

The Subiaco clinic's manager, Karen Dunmore, warned last week that
there would not be enough narcan and naltrexone to treat patients
because pharmaceutical firms had stopped supplying them.

The companies had not been paid for three weeks and the clinic owed
$60,000.

Mrs Dunmore said yesterday the clinic could not accept the
Government's offer because it could not go into more debt.

Drug supplies sent to the clinic yesterday because of the Government's
offer would be returned unopened.

"What they are asking us to do is get into more debt when we don't
have the money to cover it," Mrs Dunmore said.

Premier Richard Court announced more than six weeks ago that Dr O'Neil
would get up to $500,000 from a new $1 million trust fund to be
established. It is expected that the money will be available next week.

Mrs Dunmore said she originally had been told the cost of the
treatment drugs would be paid by the Government but she was told
yesterday the money would have to be repaid.

But a spokesman for Health Minister John Day said the agreement always
had been that the Government would act as guarantor only.

"We have always maintained we would never pay for drugs for rapid
detoxification treatment," he said.

The spokesman said the trust fund would be used to pay for other
aspects of the clinic.

The Therapeutic Goods Administration, a Federal authority, does not
recommend that naltrexone be used in the kind of rapid detoxification
programs run by Dr O'Neil.

It is understood that because the authority has not approved the
procedure, the State Government does not want its money to go directly
to rapid detoxification treatment.

Mrs Dunmore said that since Mr Court's announcement, donations - which
kept the clinic operating - had dried up.

"We've had to contact 25 people who would have been coming to the
clinic tomorrow to tell them we'll be closed," she said.

"I pray for them that something doesn't happen."

Donations would determine whether the clinic was open on Saturday, the
next detoxification treatment day.

The Federal parliamentary family and community affairs committee, in
Perth investigating the social and economic cost of drugs, visited the
Subiaco clinic yesterday.