PROGRAM TARGETS YOUTH METH USERS

Langley has been chosen to pilot a youth treatment program that will
help teens addicted to drugs like crystal meth.

Fraser Health Authority's addiction leader Sherry Mumford has chosen
Langley and if all goes according to plan, the program will be up and
running by mid-September.

"The program will go from September to March," said Mumford. "Langley
is a good place to set this up, and barring no problems with funding
and making sure we can secure the location, it will be Langley."

The pilot project will model itself after the DEWY (Day, Evening,
Weekend Program for Youth) Program which provides day treatment for
teens aged 12 to 18 years of age who have significant substance problems.

The program, open to teens across the FHA, aims to enhance motivation
to reduce or abstain from substance use. The program will offer
structured individual and group programming.

Currently the DEWY program is being offered in New Westminster with
success, said Mufford, who worked as Hope's drug and alcohol worker
for a number of years.

Teens in the DEWY program attend 35 hours per week (teens must attend
a minimum of three sessions per week).

"There are 30 communities across the FHA and they're all showing an
increase in crystal meth use. The numbers I get are from addiction
treatment providers.

And most meth addicts are multiple drug users, who use meth alongside
other drugs like marijuana, she said.

Across the FHA, crystal meth is the third most popular drug of choice
under alcohol and pot.

Separate from a recent provincial project focused on curbing the
increased use of crystal meth, the FHA has developed its own task
force to look at the popular drug.

On top of these projects, the FHA will be increasing its residential
treatment beds for youth. Currently the entire health authority - that
serves more than one million people - has two beds for girls and one
bed for boys.

"It's a 16-member board. We put it together when we saw the increase
of crystal meth use in the FHA. We too will be working on prevention
and education awareness targeting youth and children," she said.

The group is also looking at longer-term treatments that are
successful in other communities.

"We want to see if we can make them work here," said Mumford of
different forms of treatment, from outpatient programs to more intense
treatments.

On top of these projects, the FHA will be increasing its residential
treatment beds for youth. Currently the entire health authority - that
serves more than one million people - has two beds for girls and one
bed for boys.

"We will increase the beds to nine for youth for the seven-month
period." Shared government funding with the Vancouver Coastal
Authority allows the FHA to increase treatment services for that time
period.

There are 112 male residential treatment beds (intensive, in-house) in
Maple Ridge and Clearbrook. There are also some beds available for
females in Clearbrook.

There are also day treatment programs (like DEWY) that teach life
skills.

But there still aren't enough treatment facilities and beds to house
all the people needing help.

It's a common complaint among the public that there isn't enough
facilities and programs for addicts, said Mumford.

But she said it's the public which dictates funding.

The public is more likely to get behind medical equipment funding or
policing than addiction programs, she said.

"The reality is, in the long run, we all end up paying for it (
addiction aftermath)," she said. "Until we get more resources, we do
the best we can with what we have."