Connaitre ses droits

Street children are fighting against their addiction to crack cocaine in Rio

Written by Administrator Thursday, 28 July 2011 06:13

The laughter and the tears of ten children resound within the walls of the Casa Viva, a pilot rehabilitation in Rio, where they fight against their addiction to crack prematurely, which led them to live in poverty and filth of streets.

The municipality of Rio gathered in the streets of the city nearly 700 children and adolescents addicted to drugs and alcohol.

Of these, 10% to 15% of younger people are addicted to crack, a cheap derivative of cocaine with devastating effects, with consumption rising sharply in Brazil.

They take a crack because it is less expensive drugs that are readily available. But the worst is that it is addictive and causes more rapid serious neurological sequelae, told AFP Monica Blum, a charge of Social Welfare.

At Casa Viva, a dozen children aged 10 to 14 were interned and cared for by a team of doctors, psychologists and educators in substance abuse.

Lying on the ground, one of them in rehab recently was in tears and murmured, I want to go home.

He recounted that shortly after his house is the street where he took refuge for several years to escape the blows of his mother.

Matheus, Joseph and Adriel in turn are proud of the progress they have made ​​since their arrival and participate enthusiastically in the activities.

I came home so drugged that I beat my grandmother, but after I told him: + + I need help. And she led me here. When I arrived, I weighed 23 kilos, but I'm better now, remember Adriel, 14. She says be entered to 9 years in the drug world because of his mother addict.

Parallel processing, and Joseph Matheus engaged, one in football, the other vocals.

Crack addicts tend to have strange behavior, sometimes violent, clearly seen in children who arrive at Casa Viva from favelas like Jacarezinho (northern area). Last week, 38 adults and 15 children in this area were conducted in specialized centers.

There are three in this city of 7 million but they only offer one hundred and fifty beds.

According to a new law, authorities may require the minor to submit to treatment, but adults should be voluntary. In most cases, they refuse.

If the dependence is very large, they dive back, says the social worker Daphne Braga who walks to the Cracolandia where crack users congregate in the favela.

Some, still under the influence of drugs, walk to the bus that will mechanically take them.

Others resist, as Rosangela sleeping on cardboard on the sidewalk.

I do not go! she yells. You can not force me, she says, claiming to have been abused during another operation of its kind.

The increase in crack use in Brazil, where there are no official statistics-led government of former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva to launch a national plan focused on the rehabilitation of young people.

Adriel, for example, welcomes the progress and see a light at the end of the tunnel.

I want to be judge or lawyer for my grandmother is proud of me, said the girl, pretty, got a little pink blush on the cheeks.