Source: Survey of German Language Press
Pubdate: 5 Feb 99 
Courtesy: Harald Lerch  
Translator: Pat Dolan

SURVEY OF GERMAN LANGUAGE NEWSPAPERS 5 FEB 99

The Swiss edition of the Neue Zürcher Zeitung (http://www.nzz.ch) reports
as under on the "Expansion of Heroin Trial in Holland":

The Netherlands parliament decided on Wednesday that the scientific
experiment with the distribution of heroin to hard core addicts under
strict medical supervision can be expanded. 50 addicts have been treated in
Amsterdam and Rotterdam. It has since been established that the injection
rooms presented no significant disturbance in the immediate area and will
be expanded to include the Hague, Utrecht and Heerlen. The projected number
of participants is now set at round 750.

…………

The Frankfurter Neue Presse (http://www.rhein-main.net) under the headline
‘Record Drug Seizures at Airport: Customs Seize 5.2 tons’, devotes a column
to the increasing significance of Frankfurt as a revolving door for
smuggled goods. Last year upwards of 250,000 individual seizures were made
with a total value of 6 million Marks. This was nearly 5 times the figure
for 1997. 

(Also reported in the Stuttgarter Zeitung (http://www.stuttgarter-zeitung.de).

………..

Maria Zimmermann writing in the Salzburger Nachrichten
(http://www.salzburg.com/zeitung) tells of the introduction of morphine
capsules in the treatment of hard core addicts. The immediate goal is to
supply the addict’s body with what it needs ‘in legal form’. ‘We have been
prescribing it for two years now,’ said Andrea Tirpitz, head doctor of the
drug ambulance emergency aid team at the Vienna AKH. ‘There are fewer side
effects than with methadone. Pure morphine is obviously easier to
tolerate.’ The prescription of opiates as substitution therapy for addicts
in Austria is non-controversial. At the end of 1998, there were already
3,000 addicts in treatment programs, of whom 2,000 were from Vienna.

……….

Saying that it was time to say goodbye to ‘the almost uninterrupted faith
in the omnipotence of harsh punishments for drug offenders,’ Der Standard
(Austria) (http://derstandard.at) reports the Greens as asking the
legislature to "have the courage to try new policies. Harsh punishments are
no help against drugs."

…………..

A similar call (for free heroin distribution) was made by the Salzburger
Nachrichten (http://www.salzburg.com/zeitung). 

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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake