Experts and addicts praise Switzerland's unique heroin subsidy

ZURICH, Switzerland
Marco, a softspoken 30yearold, has been hooked on heroin nearly
half his life, but he wants to quit. So three times a day, he enters a Zurich
office building to shoot up. Marco's drug supplier is none other than
the Swiss government.

Marco is one of about 1,000 junkies in a staterun program that
prescribes heroin to hardcore addicts in hopes of guiding them back
into mainstream society and encouraging them to kick their deadly
habit.

The threeyear experiment, while controversial, has rendered
impressive results.

Nearly 90 of the addicts have entered programs to help them fully
withdraw from the drug, although it's too soon to judge the success of
their efforts. What is perhaps even more substantial are the side
effects for the junkies: lower rates of AIDS and other infectious
diseases and a dramatic drop in crime saving the taxpayers money.

"The crime situation is much better, and the program's cheap," says
Urs Vontobel, director of Crossline, one of 17 drug centers across
Switzerland.

"And above all it works."

Marco and about 40 other addicts treated by Crossline each pay $10 for
a day's supply of heroin.

The center's clean, if not spartan, atmosphere is unlike the filthy
Zurich rail yard that was a notorious junkie crash site until
authorities dispersed the users in 1995.

A doctor supervises the users as they inject themselves. Many of them
will chat with other addicts, but the clinic is not a social center.

Alcohol is not allowed inside and no heroin can leave the building.
The drug is stored in a safe, behind locked doors. Dealers and other
hangerson are not allowed to gather outside.

The addicts meet with counselors, who help them find housing and odd
jobs and guide them toward withdrawal.

A review of the nationwide program says that at the outset, more than
twothirds of the addicts lived off illegal activities, like
prostitution and drug peddling. By the end of 1996, this fell to 10
percent.

During the first six months of the program, the number of crimes
committed by the addicts fell by about 60 percent.

"I don't have to resort to crime and I can get cheap and clean heroin
when I need it," says Marco, who agreed to be interviewed on the
condition that his last name not be used.

"I now have the time and the will to plan my life ahead."

Marco, a lanky man with wavy dark hair, looks straight into his
listener's eyes as he tells his story. He left home at 16 after his
mother died; he lost contact with his father. He fell into the drug
scene and began selling heroin.

By mid1995, he was a hardened addict. He'd been hospitalized once for
an overdose and served four years in prison for dealing. Authorities
then made him an offer: He could get cheap heroin as long as he showed
up at the center. There were no conditions, other than that he stop
dealing.

The basic belief underlying Switzerland's heroin program is that its
30,000 or so addicts are not criminals, but people in need of help.

That liberal approach is opposed by the Association for Youth Without
Drugs, which argues that abstinence is the only way to fight drug use.
It's sponsoring a national referendum to ban all staterun drug
programs, which will go before voters in September.

Vontobel, the Crossline director, says such a course would be an
"absolute catastrophe."

"I used to work in abstinence therapy. I know how it can fail, I know
many people just can't do it. I know people who died because of that,"
he says. "At least our program is a success in the respect in that all
these people are still alive."

Switzerland has seen its drug deaths drop from 399 in 1994 to 312 last
year.

At least four of Marco's friends have died this year. "One died last
week of AIDS," he recalls without emotion.

Marco has managed to keep an apartment and occasionally work he
funds his habit with welfare payments. Now he is focusing on the next
step toward withdrawal. In September, he'll enter a twoyear therapy
course at a farmhouse in Italy, where he intends to wean himself off
heroin.

"For everyone there comes a time to stop. And now its time for me," he
says.

"Otherwise, I'll just die in some gutter somewhere."

By CLARE NULLIS, The Associated Press

Copyright (c)1997 Nando.net Copyright (c)1997 The Associated Press