Interesting story on a Retirement home for addicts

[Taverner]

Source: Scotsman
Date: 20 December 2004

Home where the old folk snort heroin
CARL HONORÉ
IN ROTTERDAM

TUCKED away in a quiet corner of this Dutch port city, Seniorenpand looks like an ordinary retirement home.

Comfortable sofas huddle around a television set in the lounge. Puzzles and tattered paperbacks fill the shelves nearby. Residents chat about the weather over tea and coffee.

But this retirement home has a twist. In the bedrooms, the elderly get high on heroin and cocaine.

"I have been using drugs most of my adult life, and I can’t stop now," says Gert-Jan, a 62-year-old resident. "Being old doesn’t mean your addiction just goes away." Funded by the city of Rotterdam and a semi-private medical foundation, Seniorenpand, is billed as the world’s first retirement home for drug addicts.

Three other Dutch cities - Amsterdam, Utrecht and The Hague - are now setting up similar refuges for their own aging addicts, and policymakers around Europe are watching the experiment.
For elderly addicts who often lack the physical strength to survive on the streets and are unwelcome at traditional retirement homes, Seniorenpand is a lifeline and there is a long waiting list for its seven rooms.

"If it weren’t for this place, I would be dead and buried now," says Gert-Jan, who uses a walking frame to get around. "This is a real home for me."

In the Netherlands, where addicts receive free medical care and methadone from the state, death rates from drug use are the lowest in Europe. Half the nation’s users are now over 40, and many are in their 60s.

Seniorenpand takes a very Dutch approach to addiction. Though encouraged to consume fewer drugs, residents are free to buy heroin and cocaine on the street. The main aim is to help addicts see out their final years in comfort and dignity.

"We do not deal drugs to the residents, but we don’t forbid them to use them either,’’ said Alexander Hogendoorn, the home’s manager.
"Some people reach a point where their addiction is irreversible, so our goal is to give them some stability and quality of life until the end comes."
Though small and modestly equipped, Seniorenpand certainly beats living on the streets. Each resident has a private room with a television and a sink.

Outside contractors do the cleaning and cooking. Medical staff visit regularly, and a social worker is on hand around the clock.
To an outsider, the blend of domesticity and drugs can seem almost surreal. One resident, for instance, has a set of needles for her knitting and another for injecting heroin.

Henny, 51, listens to Bach CDs in his spotless bedroom. Arranged neatly on the desk are a mobile phone, books, family photos - and a plastic sachet filled with brown residue.

"That was the heroin I snorted last night," he said, holding up the tiny bag. "It was pretty good stuff."

"Old addicts are just like other old people," said Carmel, 58. "All we want is a safe, quiet place where we can get on with our lives."

http://www.opioids.com/heroin/old.html

[cliffordu]

1. I can only wait for the roar from the anti-drug hysterics.

This is the model we need to use, along with legalization and taxation to pay for the programs.

Or, we could just keep building prisons.


23 years clean and sober, so don't tell me I don't know anything about it.



edit for speling (sic)

[Taverner]

2. Agree 100%

This is so much more humane - honestly is it really a "culture of life" that throws these folks out on the streets or in prison?

[anigbrowl]

10. The Economist made legalization their cover story this week

It's a good read. I also have a lot of drug experience - didn't hit any serious addiction problems, but I've seen all the highs and lows. Having lived in 5 countries (including 2 years in Amsterdam), I concur that the Dutch model of dealing with drug use as a social issue is vastly superior to the way it's handled anywhere else.

[cliffordu]

11. Yep - in this country if you smoke a joint you join the criminal class

with all it's perks and benefits.....

[jmowreader]

3. There was a reference to this need in a Cheech and Chong movie

In "Nice Dreams," the pair had made a lot of money dealing weed out of an ice cream truck, and were discussing what to do with it. Chong said he wanted to open a retirement home for old hippies, which he was going to call "Laid Back Manor." See, hippies had been around since the sixties and there wasn't a hip place for them to go, so Chong was going to open Laid Back Manor--just like a regular retirement home, except they have all the dope you can smoke.

All kidding aside, this really is a problem--someone who'd been a heroin addict for the last fifty years would probably die from attempting to detox him--or at least he'd wish he was dead. It would be really nice if OUR leaders could see the Dutch way as a better way.

Strangely enough, I was looking at drugwarfacts.org and saw an interesting set of statistics--a comparison of drug and violence indicators between the US and the Netherlands. In 2001, the past month prevalence of marijuana use in the US, where it is not legal, was nearly double that of the Netherlands, where cannabis is sold at coffee shops. The lifetime prevalence of marijuana use is also nearly half in the Netherlands.

[Taverner]

5. Love the first 3 C&C movies!!!

The last three weren't so good...

[valerief]

4. I wish I was able to retire at 51. Or 58. Or 62. Guess I gotta move to Netherlands and get a monkey

on my back.

[Taverner]

6. So you think they should just die?

[valerief]

7. I wanna retire young, too. nt

[Taverner]

8. Oh - well in that case - Yeah!

[mitchum]

9. You goddamn kids quit stepping on my dope!