UK Plans To Give Out Free Heroin To Stop Addicts From Committing Crime

Source: (Photo by Craig F. Walker/The Boston Globe via Getty Images) / (Photo by Craig F. Walker/The Boston Globe via Getty Images)

The UK Plans To Give Out Free Heroin To Stop Addicts From Committing Crimes

For the past few years, heroin has become an unprecedented epidemic that no government around the world can seem to tackle. All across the world, people are overdosing in retail stores, while driving, at the actual hospital, and anywhere you can think of. While most governments are trying to offer solutions such as rehab and other treatment, the needle is barely moving (pun intended).

But with drugs, comes crime, which stems from addicts doing whatever it takes to get the money they need to get their fix. Everyone is regularly coming up for new ways to try and counter the epidemic, but the latest offering from the UK just might be the most WTF suggestion you’ll ever hear.

The UK is planning to actually give addicts free heroin in an attempt to lower the crime rate. While the crime rate is clearly the main focus here, they will also aim to get the addicts clean, as well. The Mirror reports that only 15 people were chosen for the testing portion of this program, with the police choosing “the most prolific offenders” in Middlesbrough. The addicts will be able to get injected the Class A drug three times a day at a special NHS clinic starting this month. The program will see an annual cost of $440,000 of taxpayer money.

The new program will also lower the dosage as they continue to come for their free shoot ups. The new radical program has been met with a ton of backlash, with one mayor stating the following:

“It is not right for a commissioner who has failed so badly, and is stepping down in a matter of months, to make the Cleveland force area a guinea pig for an experimental new drugs policy when he won’t even be around to face its consequences.”

“I’m sure most right-thinking people would rather see the hundreds of thousands of pounds he is squandering on this spent on getting the basics right, by investing in frontline policing.”

We hope this program works because it seems like the chances of an addict to finesse them is higher than the odds of this ever working out.

As the streets have always said, “never trust a dope fiend, ever”. Hopefully, the UK doesn’t learn this the hard way and $400K later.