Some people were shocked, others nodded in a knowing manner when the news filtered through that there had been three local deaths last week and all of the deceased were heroin addicts.
Everyone is saddened and everyone is concerned. Something has to be done they say. There is a need for more services for addicts. There needs to be something done to combat the dealers.
Drugs use is notoriously linked to poverty-stricken and disadvantaged areas and unfortunately, it is the people with least that seem to suffer most from the consequences of drug taking. We are all asking the same questions. In many cases the dealers are known to the Gardai but they are still roaming freely on our street wreaking havoc on the youth of Kilkenny. Why are they not in jail? Many of these dealers are not even addicts themselves — they know better than to become addicted. They see the results every day, the deaths and the distraught families that are left to pick up the pieces.
Heroin addicts are somebody’s son or daughter. They were once the gurgling baby that we see in buggies on the street. Maybe they didn’t have the advantages that some of us have had, such as a safe and happy family home. Maybe as a result they made the wrong choices along the way and got caught up in the wrong crowd. Maybe they didn’t get the services that they might have needed growing up such as resource teaching, special needs assistants or extra help. Or maybe they just fell off the wagon for no apparent reason. The bottom line is that nobody wants to be a drug addict. Nobody wants to wake up every day with an indescribable urge to use heroin. Nobody wants to do the things that addicts do in order to secure their next ‘fix’ but the desire is so strong that it is almost a matter of life and death — and unfortunately it regularly ends in death.
We need a targeted educational programme for school-going kids warning of the dangers of drugs — especially heroin. We need designated beds in St Luke’s to treat addicts who are coming off drugs. We need 24-hour counselling services and we need residential services for people of all ages. Ashlinn does great work in Kilkenny for addicts helping them to come off drugs in a specially designed programme. But it is when they return back into their communities that the real problems lie. The dealers are skulking around just waiting to pounce — just when addicts are at their most vulnerable.
Micheal Martin was shocked to hear that heroin was so rampant in Kilkenny and this is part of the problem. Government needs to know that drugs are not just an urban problem — they are everywhere. The onus will be on the new government to sort this out.
