The number of people addicted to drugs is slowly reducing, but drug trafficking is on the increase, this was the estimation from the National Committee on AIDS, Drugs and Prostitution, which was held at a ceremony in Hanoi on Friday.

The ceremony was held in order to review the ‘fight on drugs’ over the last ten years.

Since 2007, the number of drug addicts has dropped to 146,000 people nationalwide. Most of them are unemployed and have left school at an early age.

However, younger addicts have increased. In 2001, the number of the addicts below 30 years of age accounted for nearly 58 percent. It has now skyrocketed to over 68 percent. Additionally, the number of people injecting drugs has also increase from 46 to 85 percent.

Furthermore, drug trafficking in Vietnam has changed with now the appearance of new types of ‘crystal synthetic drugs’. This is causing authorities some difficulty in detecting this new form of drug.

Attending the ceremony, Truong Tan Sang, Politburo member and permanent member of the Party’s Central Committee Secretariat, has ordered relevant authorities to increase the fight against the HIV/AIDS, drugs and prostitution.

He said, more investment should be made in building rehabilitation centers and job-training centers should assist in the reintegration, of those that had drug problems, back into the community.

Source: SGGP