Coolmine Therapeutic Community has seen 31% rise in demand for services

The oldest rehabilitation centre in Ireland saw a 31 per cent increase in demand for its drug addiction treatment in 2014.

In its annual report for 2014, Coolmine Therapeutic Community said that there was also an increase in heroin as the primary drug of choice for their clients accessing services.

The report shows that almost seven in 10 women and half of the men in residential therapy cited their addiction to heroin.

CEO of Coolmine Pauline McKeown said the increase in heroin usage was down to supply and demand.

“What we’re aware of is that about a year and a half ago production increased in Afghanistan in those areas, which is what we’re seeing now coming into Europe and more specifically coming into Ireland,” Ms McKeown said.

The centre worked with 1,250 people last year through its community, day and residential programmes, and 67 per cent of admissions were female.

The Coolmine female residential service, Ashleigh House, doubled its occupancy to 24 women at any one time, and also developed its mother and child service which treated 67 mothers in 2014.

Ms McKeown said the main thing which can reduce drug addiction is a “joined-up approach where we have a continuum of care, where we have a range of services, harm-reduction initiatives through to aftercare and recovery related supports for people”.

The Minister of State with responsibility for drugs Aodhán Ó Ríordáin said at the launch of the report on Tuesday that Irish society must change its mindset when it comes to addiction issues.

“Every family in Ireland has an addiction problem, and every family in Ireland has been traumatised by that addiction problem.”

The Minister said the nature of drug-usage was changing rapidly, and policy-makers were trying to “constantly catch up with an evolving and changing drugs problem”.

Mr Ó Ríordáin said he would discuss what he believes to be the three most important issues surrounding drug addiction at a conference at the end of this month. “One is the potential for drug decriminalisation, secondly is to talk about the potential for the introduction of consumption rooms, and third is to tackle this epidemic, in my view, of poly drug use.”

The Minister also said he was confident the Misuse of Drugs Act would be legislated by the end of this year.