Myanmar's Opium Users Have Few Options

Daniel De Carteret, Simon Lewis

TAUNGGYI, MYANMAR— Phone Myint Han has been addicted to opium for eight years. The 26-year-old from Myanmar once attempted to come clean at a state-run facility, one of the few options available to addicts here. But he found little help in a place where he said, addicts were seen as criminals, rather than patients.

“It is like a prison,” the 26-year-old recalled of the facility, which is based in the township hospital of Taunggyi. “I went there once and I felt that I didn’t have any freedom.”

Failed by government services Phone Myint Han quickly fell back into a pattern of drug use. He would take a combination of “formula” — a concoction of diluted opium and cough syrup highly popular among young people in Taunggyi, as well as methamphetamines and other substances he could get his hands on.

In Taunggyi, nestled in the hills of Shan State — the second-largest opium producing area in the world, a local U.N. official estimates that 40 percent of young people are using the readily available drug.

Services to support addicts are severely lacking in Taunggyi and elsewhere in ethnic minority regions. That means hundreds of thousands of young people could become lost to addiction, casting a shadow over Myanmar's progress in other areas in recent years.

China Market Fuels Drug Boom

Opium production in Shan State has soared in the past decade, with the vast majority of the crop processed into heroin to feed growing demand in China. Since opium traders are known to use methamphetamine pills, or “yama,” for currency, the area is also awash with cheap uppers.

Read more: http://www.voanews.com/content/myanmars-opium-users-few-options/2951334.html

- Voice of America 2015-09-08

I think the author meant "Ya Ba" pills.... Which for newbies means "crazy drug" ..

why anyone would take opium or heroin is beyond me they know they will get addicted and it will ruin there life so I have no sympathy for them!!!!

I think the author meant "Ya Ba" pills.... Which for newbies means "crazy drug" ..

It used to be called "yaa máa", and still in is Myanmar.

Even found a link for that on Wikipedia. Gotta love Wikipidea.

“I went there once and I felt that I didn’t have any freedom.”

freedom? haha freedom to get more opium. junkies don't have free will. they are driven by urge to get drug whatever it takes.

and yes, the chance for them to stop is very low. the only solution for this problem is a special camp or an island where all junkies will have to spend all there miserable lifes. without any support from normal society. because normal people don't owe anything to junkies.

they are addicted? it's no one else fault. once it was there free choice to start to use drugs. that's why only junkies themselves and not decent citizens should suffer from repercussions.

I believe sooner or later humanity will come to this solution.

ibogaine, is one of them options, cheap, give you a trip so you see your past

and clear you up

sadly, also illegal

ibogaine, is one of them options, cheap, give you a trip so you see your past

and clear you up

sadly, also illegal

do you take ibogaine on a regular basis?

why anyone would take opium or heroin is beyond me they know they will get addicted and it will ruin there life so I have no sympathy for them!!!!

Oh, just like alcohol then...