Drug Addiction "Solution"?

[Dino]

I'll get the link from the BBC, but this is the story

Drug addicts across the UK are being offered money to be sterilised by an American charity.

Project Prevention is offering to pay £200 to any drug user in London, Glasgow, Bristol, Leicester and parts of Wales who agrees to be operated on.

The first person in the UK to accept the cash is drug addict "John" from Leicester who says he "should never be a father".

The move has been criticised by some drug charities who work with addicts.

Project Prevention founder Barbara Harris admitted her methods amounted to "bribery", but said it was the only way to stop babies being physically and mentally damaged by drugs during pregnancy.

Drug treatment charity Addaction estimates one million children in the UK are living with parents who abuse drugs.

Pregnant addicts can pass on the dependency to the unborn child, leading to organ and brain damage.

Mrs Harris set up her charity in North Carolina after adopting the children of a crack addict.

Speaking to the BBC's Inside Out programme, she said: "The birth mother of my children obviously dabbled in all drugs and alcohol - she literally had a baby every year for eight years.

"I get very angry about the damage that drugs do to these children."

After paying 3,500 addicts across the United States not to have children, she is now visiting parts of the UK blighted by drugs to encourage users to undergo "long-term birth control" for cash.

John, a 38-year-old addict from Leicester, is the first person in the UK to accept money to have a vasectomy after being involved in drugs since he was 12.

He said: "It was something that I'd been thinking about for a long time.

"I won't be able to support a kid; I can just about manage to support myself."

Simon Antrobus, chief executive of Addaction, said while no-one wanted to see children brought up in a drug-using environment, there was no place for Project Prevention in the UK.

"It exploits very vulnerable people who are addicted to drugs and alcohol at probably the lowest point in their lives," he said.

The Reverend Robert Black, of Victory Outreach, which works with former addicts in east London, said he thought Project Prevention's aims were "very devious".

Maria Cripps, project manager at the Hackney Dovetail Centre which works with drug users and their carers, said: "I think Barbara uses some very extreme examples to get her point across. It might work in America but Great Britain is a very different country."

But Reverend Martin Blakebrough, director of Camden's Kaleidoscope Project in north London, said sterilisation was "worth considering" if it was right for the individual.

A spokesperson at the British Medical Association said: "The BMA's ethics committee does not have a view on the charity Project Prevention.

"As with all requests for treatment, doctors need to be confident that the individual has the capacity to make the specific decision at the time the decision is required.

"The BMA's ethics committee also believes that doctors should inform patients of the benefits of reversible contraception so that the patients have more reproductive choices in the future."

I think this is terrible. There are only 1 million children with drug addict parents according to that report, is this really the best way?
I've had my home broken into by drug addicts and had stuff nicked. And even at my most furious I still wouldn't endorse something like this?

This policy makes no attempt to "fix" (for want of a better word) the users.
£200 isn't going to buy that many drugs. The problem is not going to be solved.

Isn't this a glimpse into Britian after the spending cuts?

"First they came for the drug addicts/ And I did nothing/ For I was not a drug addict" etc...

[SiHart]

It's an absolutely abhorrent idea. Once you start down this road, it becomes very difficult to stop it. I mean, what's next, people with a criminal conviction sterilised, then people from low income familes who scrounge on benefits? Where do you stop?

I find this very worrying. Who do this "charity" think they are?

Si xx

[Lissa]

It's also likely that men who've been sterilised will stop using a condom when having sex because they won't think they need one and start picking up and spreading STDs.

[Dino]

Plus, this woman running the scheme is unelected so if it all goes wrong she's unaccountable as she'll probably be on the first plane out of the UK to bring her "benevolence" to another unsuspecting country?

[WhiteCrowNZ]

I dunno. The idea is kind of monsterous, but what it's trying to achieve isn't.

If there is one fact, it's that our population is on a runaway track. I still think from my O-level geography we've a world population of 4 billion - when it's now over 6 billion.

Possibly the only way to tackle the runaway population is going to be with some pretty unpalitable measures - on the scheme of what might happen, this is just on the naughty step of actions ... or maybe I shouldn't have been up last night reading about 1984 again ...

[SiHart]

I dunno. The idea is kind of monsterous, but what it's trying to achieve isn't.

If there is one fact, it's that our population is on a runaway track. I still think from my O-level geography we've a world population of 4 billion - when it's now over 6 billion.

Possibly the only way to tackle the runaway population is going to be with some pretty unpalitable measures - on the scheme of what might happen, this is just on the naughty step of actions ... or maybe I shouldn't have been up last night reading about 1984 again ...

Yeah, but as I said Mike, where does that end? Once you start introducing measures like this, it's not so long before you reach measures like stopping whole sections of the community having babies, then bigger sections, then it spreads by religion, by race... and well, you can see where I'm going.

A much better way forward is better sex education- get people to understand what having a baby is all about, amke them THINK before they do it, instead of sterilising great sections of the population.

Si xx

[Dirk Gently]

The problem with that as I see it Si, is that people on drugs aren't usually thinking straight. They have babies because they have sex unwillingly or without concious thought & end up with them.
I have a cousin-in-law in America who is/was on drugs. She has had 5 kids & all of them taken away from her. (The first one has been fostered by her brother but he can't have any more). And my Mother-in-law is a teacher & knows from experience that "drug babies/kids" have emotional & behavioral problems.

I'm not saying this thinking is right, but my point is that even with all the education in the world drug addicts are still going to have babies. It's the drug addiction that needs targeting, not procreation.

[SiHart]

You're right Tim and of course, there's no mention of actually getting the addicts off the drugs in the article either, which seems a huge oversight. They're dealing with one of the symptoms but not the root cause.

Si xx

[Si Hunt]

Yeah, but as I said Mike, where does that end? Once you start introducing measures like this, it's not so long before you reach measures like stopping whole sections of the community having babies, then bigger sections, then it spreads by religion, by race... and well, you can see where I'm going.

Regardless of whether or not I agree with this or if it addresses the actual problem (which it doesn't) I'm struggling to see the downside. It's not like there's any danger of us becoming extinct is it? So what if large sections of the community stop having babies? We are overcrowded enough as it is. And it's voluntary.

Si.

[SiHart]

What happens when it stops being voluntary? When a scheme like this becomes so successful that it's applied on a national then international scale? The idea of taking away that basic freedom from vast numbers of people scares me.

Si xx

[Si Hunt]

But it IS voluntary. It's a big leap from offering this operation to people to forcing it upon them. Couldn't you have the same worries over "loss of freedom" towards ANY treatment for drug addiction?

I guess the difference is that it's non-reversable. So you'd get people claiming they "wern't in their right mind" when they had it, and sueing.

Si.

[SiHart]

I'm just worrying unnecessarily Si.

Si xx

[WhiteCrowNZ]

Interesting input from Tim. Me and Collette looked into foster parenting - one of the stories we were told about was about a woman who was declared unfit to have children. She kept getting pregnant and having one baby after another - and they kept being taken into care.

Collette was horrified and said why is it social services will take the babies away but not prevent the woman from having babies. Of course the social workers were horrified at that. But should we be like that? Should unwanted or abused babies be the collateral damage of our freedom?

[Captain Tancredi]

I think people are getting a bit confused and overheated about this and seeing things that aren't there. It's not so much an attempt to stop drug addicts breeding per se as an attempt to give them an incentive not to bring children into the world who are proportionately more likely to have health and development problems or brought up in a nurturing environment. It might not be right for everybody, but if somebody is enough of an adult to bring a child into the world or stick a needle in their arm, then they're enough of an adult to make this kind of decision.

[Jon Masters]

A typically oversimplistic approach to a very complex social problem, and easily the thin edge of the wedge.
She's concerned about babies being born who are damaged or addicted, but what about those who are given drugs after birth or neglected ? Let's take all of them away as well ? Then what about those children who live in households where emotional or physical suffering takes place because of alcohol misuse - shall we pay to take those too ?

The birth mother of my children obviously dabbled in all drugs and alcohol

(my emphasis) .

So, hanging around at teenage parties or when the drunks come out on a Friday night with a pair of bricks might be a good idea

After all, I bet everyone who becomes dependent on drugs will be (a) Grateful for £200 to spend on.....I wonder what and (b) Will never, ever be cured so will never want children in the future.

[Rob McCow]

It's a big leap from offering this operation to people to forcing it upon them.

Possibly. Though is it a big leap to give it a lot of advertising? Then to make people think that it's a good idea by showing them the benefits of sterilisation? And so on... But I agree that it'd be a long way from being legally enforced.

As an alternative view, sometimes having a child can be exactly what a person needs to get them off the drugs, to show them that they have real responsibilities. It may not work for everyone, but you can't deny that having a son or daughter is a life-changing experience for most people.