Rooms for heroin users a first step

Minister of State Noel Ahern, who has special responsible for the government’s drugs strategy, is seriously considering the possibility of providing consumption rooms for heroine addicts, following discussions with his German counterpart.

The rooms would provide a safe environment for addicts where the quality of their heroine could be tested to insure that it is not contaminated.

The proposal is obviously at a very early stage and amounts to a kind of political trial balloon, but the minister deserves credit for having the courage to address the thorny and extremely emotive issue. Of course, this government has never been short of ideas, but it has frequently lacked the leadership, or the courage and conviction to go through with the ideas expressed.