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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 5 Hansard (15 May) . . Page.. 1565 ..

Mrs Carnell (continuing):

(9) and (10) All schools in the ACT base their curriculum development on the ACT Curriculum Frameworks for Health and Physical Education. Drug education is addressed in Health of Individuals and Populations and Safety and Human Relations strands of ACT Curriculum Frameworks. Schools approach drug education topics in a variety of ways to suit their students' needs.

The exact time allocated to drug education in ACT Schools cannot be calculated. However, in ACT Schools drug education is included in the key learning areas of Health and Physical Education. The Department of Education and Training actively promotes a range of drug education initiatives throughout the system as part of a comprehensive health and social education program. 1996 saw an expansion of the provision of Drug Education support provided to schools in the ACT government education system.

(11) As at 9 April 1997 the ACT Methadone Program had 286 clients and the private program had 110 clients registered.

(12) There is a waiting list for the public methadone program. The waiting time varies between one - two weeks. At any one time there are between 10 -15 people of the waiting list.

(13) There are a few situations when, based on individual assessment, a client may be refused methadone treatment on the public program. Examples of these situations are; clients who are assessed as not being dependent on opioids or people under duress. On rare occasions clients may be involuntarily withdrawn from methadone, usually due to violent behaviours or repeated misuse of their methadone dose. Each client situation is assessed individually and all clients are referred to alternative services.

(14) Conditions for placement on the public methadone program are as follows: demonstrated opioid dependence; willingness and ability to participate in the program; ACT resident and availability of treatment places in ACT (currently restricted to 400 places).

Generally treatment is for people over the age of 18 years, however, each client is assessed individually, therefore clients under 18 years will be treated occasionally.

(15) Other treatments are available for people dependent on heroin including: detoxification, counselling, therapeutic communities.

The feasibility of trialing other pharmaco-therapies is being considered in Victoria. Specifically the drugs under consideration are LAAM, bufrenorphine, naltrexone and slow release morphine. The proposed ACT Heroin trial is being considered nationally.

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