Sarah Helm: Drug Foundation CEO on the increased use of meth, lack of support for meth-addictions

The Drug Foundation says the country barely invests anything into helping and supporting people with meth-addiction.  

Discharges from public hospitals suggest meth-use has increased four-fold over the past decade. 

Wastewater testing last year showed a doubling in meth use.  

Drug Foundation Chief Executive Sarah Helm told Mike Hosking a lot more could be done, especially with knowledge from new research.  

She says about half of people using illicit substances have ADHD, which could help prevent drug-use if treated. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
More meth trouble in a country seemingly besotted with the stuff.
We've got a fourfold increase in hospital discharges. This is
in the last ten years. It's gone from seven hundred
and fifty seven people to three thousand, ninety five. Drug
Foundation boss Sarah Helmer's with a Sarah, very good morning
to you.

Speaker 2 (00:14):
Good more name.

Speaker 1 (00:14):
See the interesting thing about three thousand and ninety five
not to understate what's going on with meth and the
various problems in this country, but they're canceled in a
single day yesterday with the strike over four thousand procedures.
So three thousand in a year is not that many people,
or is it.

Speaker 2 (00:30):
Look, I think we have every right to be concerned
about the number of people who are presenting with meth
and fetter men harm. So to me, what this figure
really shows is a bit like what the minister just said.
We need to invest much earlier on and not wait
until somebody is presenting an d or ending up in
jail before we offer them any help.

Speaker 1 (00:52):
I mean, literally, what are you invest in? Do you
stop me buying the meth in the first place, Do
you stop the price of the myth going down? Do
you give me a job so I don't feel like
taking meth?

Speaker 2 (01:00):
What do you do at the moment. We're barely investing
anything in help or support or what actually works, so
we need to invest in those things. So there's been
a really good program up north on mepmphetamine that's been successful.
We've been calling for that to be rolled out for
years now and invested in properly treatment support. So that

(01:23):
is the least funded area of health, the lowest paid profession. Moreover,
there's a lot that can be done to support people
and very cost effective peer based, community run things when
they have methaduction. You don't necessarily need to go to
rehab if you like. There's stuff in particular that we've
found out recently about half of people who use illicit

(01:46):
stimulants like meth andphetamine have untreated ADHD. We might actually
be able to make huge inroads into prevention and helping
people through that more successfully recover if you like treating
the idea?

Speaker 1 (02:03):
Actually, okay, are we an outlier in the Western world
we've seen besotted with the stuff? Are we or as
just the whole Western world besotted with it?

Speaker 2 (02:10):
There's two things. We actually have an unusual drug profile.
It's true, but that is because we don't have some
other kind of worse drugs. So it's a lot of mess. Well,
some of the really potent typeioids that are causing.

Speaker 1 (02:26):
Fatality in America, for example, Yeah, the people in San
Francisco bent over, unable to move and all that sort
of thing.

Speaker 2 (02:36):
We have had some presentation of that here, but not
a lot. So really it's yeah, it's there is a
massive increase in the drug supply globally, and that's part
of what we're seeing reflected here. And we've had some
change in our local criminal activity and that's resulted in
a very significant price decline over the last year.

Speaker 1 (02:55):
But I don't have time to argue with you, and
I'm not actually arguing with you all you people talk
the same way. You talk about how cheap it is
and how the gangs are dreadful, and I agree with
all of that, but somewhere someone's got to own some
responsibility for themselves. I couldn't give a crap how cheap
method is. I'm not taking any where's that argument.

Speaker 2 (03:15):
Yeah, look, that's fine. It's a bit similar with alcohol.
You know, eleven percent of our presentations d alcohol relators.
We might think that that's bad behavior, and there's some
other things that we could do to prevent that roost harm.
So yeah, I think we can just say don't do it.
But I think that's exactly what we've been doing for
many years and it hasn't actually worked. So let's try

(03:37):
and do what will work.

Speaker 1 (03:38):
Okay, Sarah, I appreciate your time. Sarah helm who's the
Drug Foundation boss, with us this morning. For more from
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