KARACHI: Heroin kills hundreds of addicts every year
By S. Raza Hassan
KARACHI, Feb 24: As many as 800 bodies of heroin addicts were collected from the streets of the metropolis in 2002 as against 375 in the previous year.
The data, compiled by the Edhi Foundation, shows that the addicts’ mortality rate has registered an alarming increase of more than 110 per cent.
A large number of vagabond heroin addicts are found lying dead on the streets of the city and, at times, in storm drains. Police usually send their bodies to the Edhi Foundation for burial. According to the procedure, followed by the Foundation, a heroin addict’s body is kept for three days during which the photograph of the deceased is taken and a code number is allotted for record. If nobody turns out to claim the body while placed in Edhi morgue, the same is buried and the code number is affixed on the gravestone. Most of the bodies remain unclaimed till burial and after.
It is very difficult to ascertain the actual number of heroin addicts death for several reasons. The only source is Edhi Foundation which, obviously, is not supposed to have received all the victims. Quite often, severe cold wave, scorching heat and other natural calamities take a heavy toll on addicts. Heroin addicts are eventually disowned by their families in most cases. Their ultimate abode becomes any place under the sky. The families usually lose contacts with their abandoned member. And after some time they become strangers to each other.
Accountability is another burden unacceptable to police, Edhi Foundation or any other organization.
“We do not accept bodies of heroin addicts with the referral letters from the police station concerned,” an Edhi Foundation spokesman said.
The bodies did not undergo postmortem examination as medico-legal officers (MLOs) fear that they might carry transmittable diseases due to the addicts’ trend of using second-hand syringes.
Admitting that such an examination is not conducted, an MLO at the Jinnah Post-graduate Medical Centre disputed the reason. He said the reason was to avoid unnecessary waste of time and resources. Normally, cause of an addict’s death is quite evident.
Facts and figures show that an average of 25 to 30 heroin addicts a day were brought to the Edhi Foundation by police last year. The number surged drastically to 40 to 45 a day when police came hard on addicts. The addicts often complained that police snatched all the money they possessed when caught. “A crackdown on addicts is launched when petty thefts in a particular area increase and police come under pressure to bring the situation under control,” the Edhi Foundation spokesman opined. He indicated that some police stations used to bring lots of drug addicts so frequently. After spending a week or so at the centre, he added, the new comers are allowed to leave on their own request. Some of them return to the centre in the next police round up and this cycle continues, he explained.
Any relative or acquaintance of a heroin addicts seldom approaches the Foundation/centre for a family reunion with him.
A resident of Chakiwara, Sattar Siddiqui, is puzzled over what to do for his younger brother who has been a heroin addict for several years. All his efforts for the rehabilitation of the poor boy have proved futile.
“No rehabilitation centre, at least in the public sector, has appropriate facilities to get a person rid of addiction and help rehabilitate him. The facilities at private sector institutions are beyond an ordinary man’s resource limits. They are overcrowded, too,” says Mr Siddiqui in sheer frustration. I have no option but to hand him over to police, he moaned without knowing that police would ultimately send his addict brother to Edhi centre for a brief stay before he is allowed to find a ‘suitable sanctuary’.
None of the city’s major hospitals — Civil Hospital and Jinnah Post-graduate Medical Centre — has a fully functional detoxification unit. At the JPMC’s Psychiatry Ward, heroin addicts are admitted for treatment but could not be provided specific bed and other facilities due to lack of resources, mainly finds, as suggested by Dr Iqbal Afridi, an associate professor at the hospital. Plans to make detoxification units functional have hit snags.
Addicts should not be treated as ‘persona non grata’ by his family but a patient who deserves special attention of the family and the society, and special treatment as well, according to Dr Afridi.
He points out that a heroin addict loses his capacity of judgement and decision making and thus turns criminal. He indulges in criminal activities for money to buy heroin. The addiction also makes him so weak to undertake strenuous physical labour due to which his activities remain confined to petty crimes like thefts.
It is no more a secret that unscrupulous policemen play a vital role in making heroin available at specific points in the city known to every addict — old and new. Such areas, including some in the former districts South and West, have become notorious for having such trading points and dens where the white powder is easily available to the consumers.
