Afghanistan’s poppy fields provides most of the world’s opium …
Creating a crisis of addiction in the country.
So, these are all increasing the threat to the population exponentially.
The old ... the young.
The men … and the women …
Drugs’ grip on Afghanistan's society and economy ---
On The Inside Story: Afghanistan’s Addiction Crisis.
Hi. I’m Katherine Gypson, VOA’s Congressional Correspondent.
While members of Congress and others debate the tactics of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and the strategies of 20 years of war, there is one issue that has constantly plagued that country: Drugs. Narcotics. Specifically, opium.
According to the U.N., Afghanistan produces 80 percent of the world’s opium.
While the rest of the world tries to deal with the trafficking of the drug, millions of people are addicted inside Afghanistan.
Before the U.S. withdrawal, VOA’s Afghan Service traveled through the country to document the extent of Afghanistan’s Addiction Crisis.
Our grim trip begins in the capital, Kabul.
In Afghanistan, this is where, and how, it sometimes ends. A drug addict’s life.
Health workers came to round-up the addicts and take them to addiction treatment centers. But today they encounter the lifeless bodies of three addicts.
Here, at Kabul’s “Pul-e-Sokhta” bridge, the health workers face the grim, and heavy chore of removing the bodies, hauling them up to the street and away for burial. If no family can be located, they will be laid in an unmarked grave, with no one to mourn their loss. It is the mark of shame to be buried alone in Afghanistan.
For the workers and government officials, it reminds them they cannot help everyone.
Dr. Aref Wafa was working with addicts.
Especially when we come here in the winter, our goal is to save their lives. They may increase the dose due to cold or chills. When they overdose, they do not feel it, therefore, this causes their death.
Doctors say, these addicts are consuming heroin, morphine, opium and increasingly, crystal meth. The cause of death is usually a drug overdose. They are taken to a Kabul cemetery for burial. How many bodies are buried there? No one knows. Officials don’t track the numbers.
Gholam Yahya’s brother lost his life to addiction under the bridge. Yahya, an addict like his brother, still lives under this bridge. Now, he describes the sadness—and shame—and how addicts’ deaths are treated by religious leaders.
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They said those who use drugs, commit suicide. Since they commit suicide, their funeral prayers are forbidden. They cannot be washed. His mother did not bring her child to this world to end up under Pull-e-Sokhta bridge. He did not wish this for himself., but I could not bury him in any cemetery.
In Kabul’s ‘Pul-e-Sokhta area, this is not just the story of Gholam Yahya’s life.
Throughout Afghanistan, it is known as a drug addiction center. The bridge in western Kabul has become a major hub for drug users for the past two decades. An iconic symbol of drug abuse in a nation rife with addiction.
The addicts don’t come just from Kabul, but many from the provinces, too. Hundreds of them share this grimy space, spending their days and nights getting high amidst the waste and debris. Most of them have been evicted by their families and have no shelter.
They live in squalor, surrounded by filth, black walls, and dirty water.
Over the years there have been several unsuccessful attempts to close the area. But it remains a popular gathering place for addicts.
Nazo is one of many looking for loved ones. Her husband and brother are addicted to drugs. Nazo's husband uses opium and is remarried. He left her with the responsibility of taking care of their six boys. In Afghanistan, single mothers with no men in the house face a particularly difficult life, especially when the single mother is the only breadwinner. This is why Nazo hopes to find her brother, who is a heroin addict.
It has been five months since I went to Kart-e-now, Arzan Qemat, Jada, and Cinema-e-Pamir to Shama-li so that anyone could tell me his whereabouts. I don’t know the area. I went to ask. I got home about ten o'clock at night. I am a woman. I cannot bear this grief, if God forbid. someone touches me or someone talks dirty behind my back.
In addition to her six children, Nazo also has been taking care of her mother and her brother’s wife. She washes dishes and cleans people’s laundry, making about $2.60 a day.