Drugs strategy - Injecting rooms may be a solution

A MID-TERM review of the National Drugs Strategy 2001-2008 would seem to point to a divergence of opinion - and policy - within the Government in its approach to dealing with drugs in the country’s prisons.

Drug use is endemic in jails and to try to deal with it on the basis that it is illegal and therefore not to be tolerated is to be subjective to an unrealistic extent.

Under the review, Noel Ahern, the junior minister with responsibility for the National Drugs Strategy, is not opposed to the introduction of injecting rooms for addicts in the prisons.