A letter of protest submitted to the Government by RHRN and its partners
October 9th, 2009
The statistics and the researches elaborated so far show that out of Romania's cities, Bucharest has over 90% of the injection drug users (IDU). As a lately reality of the past few years, the drug use represents a problem that the community is facing and that should sensitize and actively and efficiently engage the local authorities.
In regards with the "Prof.dr. Al. Obreja" Psychiatry Hospital's management decision to temporarily close the Drug Addicts' Day care Stationary within the Mental Health Centre, 4th district, some NGOs, which provide social-medical services for over 5,000 IDUs, express their concern on the potential consequences of this decision.
Therefore, the organizations united within the Romanian Harm Reduction Network (RHRN) submitted an official letter to the Romanian Government and Ministry of Public Health stating a re-evaluation of the situation and ensuring an alternative and viable solution to continue the recovery treatment for people who had already started the treatment.
Considering the temporarily closure of the Day care Stationary within Obregia Hospital, the 290 patients will have to be redirected to other public pr private recovery centers being quite difficult to approximate whether this can actually be possible. Moreover, not all the patients will be able to sustain the costs for medical services provided within the private system.
Limiting the IDU access to treatment in the specialized centers can determine them to go back to heroine, to possible overdoses, HIV infection or B, C hepatitis and also committing criminalities.
The decision to close down the Stationary is about to be discussed on Monday, October 12th by the Ministry of Health authorities together with the subscribed organizations, in order to come up with an answer to the NGOs and identify a solution to unblock the situation arisen.
You can access here the Open Letter submitted by the RHRN member organizations.
