Ethical Dilemmas of Heroin Prescription - Eurad

Treatment should be about helping the individual to overcome his or her health problem, McKeganey thinks.

"There is certainly evidence that by prescribing heroin to an addict you can reduce that person’s involvement in criminal behaviour. But is crime reduction a legitimate goal for the doctor ...?" 

"My own view is that it is important for the individual, whether they are addicted or not, to retain the responsibility for their actions and their drug use since it is only in the realisation of that responsibility that their eventual recovery lies. Within those terms doctors should reject the entreaty from politicians and others to become society’s drug dealer because to do otherwise runs the risk of undermining the very fundamentals of what addiction treatment is all about namely helping individuals to overcome their dependency."

- McKeganeys paper uncovers what seems to be at stake in the debate about heroin prescription, namely the how we understand and define treatment and addiction. The meaning of these concepts is fundamental not only to this particular debate about heroin prescrition but to how we deal with the drugs problem overall, says Anders Ulstein, secretary general of Eurad.

"Prescribing Heroin to Heroin Addicts: A Drug Policy in Search of a Disaster?" by Neil McKeganey, Professor of Drug Misuse Research, University of Glasgow, Scotland 2009. (Published with consent of the author).

mckeagney(6 4kb)Below is another article by Professor Mckeganey in the British Medical Journal from January 2008 where he debates with Jürgen Rehm and Benedikt Fischer about heroin prescription. Neil McKeganey: "Should heroin be prescribed to heroin misusers? No" BMJ Jan 2008; 336: 71; doi:10.1136/bmj.39422.503241

British Medical Journal from January 2008(1 3 7kb)