For The Bohol Tribune
In This Our Journey
NESTOR MANIEBO PESTELOS
Now that Bohol’s first drug
rehabilitation center is about to operate this month, it may be good to talk
about how we can support it. Rene Francisco, CEO of the FITWBK (Farm It Works
Balay Kahayag) Chemical Dependency Treatment Center, arrived the other day with
the technical and administrative staff to finalize and implement plans to
renovate and equip the facility and have everything in place in accordance with
existing guidelines.
By this time, the Municipal
LGU of Baclayon and the barangay councils within the immediate catchment area
(barangays Laya, Montana and Cambanac) have been oriented on the policies and
procedures of the Center. Once it is ready for full operations, the
newly-formed staff from the partners, Family and Recovery Management Center from
Minglanilla, Cebu and the It Works Chemical Dependency Treatment Center, will
formally invite representatives from the Provincial Government, the various
agencies, faith-based and civil society organizations to formally open discussion
for possible partnership.
The facility is located at
the Balay Kahayag Training Center compound in Laya, Baclayon. A number of
queries have been received on admission procedures and we have referred these
to the executive staff composed of Rene Francisco, COO; Jimmy Clemente, CEO;
and Alain Alino, Center Director.
Queries can be made with
Director Alino at Mobile number 09173250252 or with the Administrative Officer,
Martin Cinco at 09774506285 or at email raemartin-cinco@yahoo.com.
The Pestelos family, which
owns the BK facilities that will be improved upon and used by FITWBK, and the
Bohol Local Development Foundation, Inc. (BLDF) which has carried out intensive
research and consultations on having a drug rehabilitation center in the
province and undertaken liaison work with the two partner entities, are not
part of the management nor of the administrative staff of the facility.
This is to enable the FITWBK to be managed as a business
enterprise to ensure its financial sustainability. Its clients will be
charged standard or regular fees. The management will exercise functions as
befit a commercial entity to ensure financial viability for the enterprise.
Although a business concern, it will be run as a
social enterprise, with its profit used to operate the business and the profit
to be channeled to contribute to the objective of helping increase the access
of drug abuse victims from among the youth to high-quality services offered by
the FITWBK.
It has been agreed between BLDF and the FITWBK
Management that for every ten (10) paying clients, an additional two (2) will
be non-paying who will be recommended jointly by DSWD and BLDF as coming from
indigent families. This number will still not be enough to cope with hundreds
of young people who have become drug abusers in recent years, most of them from
marginalized families who will not be able to pay for center fees although
these are much lower than those charged in similar facilities outside the
province.
This is a critical area needing support from the
Government, private sector and civil society organizations. They may want to sponsor
clients to the Center on a sharing basis with the individual families and the
Center management. The latter has had experiences on such arrangement and it
will conduct an information campaign on this vital aspect of its operations.
The other opportunity for supporting FITWBK is to help
in addressing the tremendous demand expected of its services in a province
where around 70% of reported crimes are drug-related. This is an area requiring
determined action from both Government and civil society organizations.
Despite the presence of the FITWBK, which is still limited in its intake
capacity in relation to the huge demand for pre-treatment or diagnostic and
treatment services, we still need to have a more systematic approach to broaden
access to such services.
A contact point is needed between a service facility and the families
affected by drug abuse and pave the way for their drug-related problems to be
systematically addressed. Some ways must be found to relieve FITWBK of some
tasks related to this need so it can focus on the treatment aspect of its operations.
As I said in previous columns, almost fifty percent in a 21-column run I did on the subject of
drug addiction since early this year, we need to establish what is called
Outreach and Drop-In Centers (ODICs) by the UN or Substance Abuse and Family
Enhancement (SAFE) by other agencies. Whether called ODIC or SAFE, this
facility has these common objectives:
a. To provide early intervention services and counseling to drug addicts to prevent relapse;
b. To provide motivation and counseling to the addicted persons, and co-dependents/family members to seek treatment;
c. To involve the community and significant others to help the drug addicts and their families in their recovery journeys;
d. To reach out and provide basic information, knowledge and literature to addicted persons who do not want to appear in the treatment center;
e. To provide home-based treatment for those in remote areas, particularly women where treatment facilities are not available;
f. To provide a place and encourage the meetings of the support groups for recovering persons and co-dependents;
g. To facilitate vocational training, job placements, develop self-employment and income generating activities for recovering persons; and
h. To help recovering persons to join mainstream society as productive citizens and continue their recovery journey successfully.
The activities
undertaken in this facility are as follows:
1. Outreach visits;
2. Early intervention strategies such as pre-treatment
counseling, home-based detoxification;
3. Short-term outpatient or home-based treatment;
4. Referrals to hospitals or drug treatment centers;
5. Organization and conduct of education and training programs
by professionals on drug awareness,
6. Training of outreach support staff and volunteers,
7. Skills training; and
8. Encouraging family members to come to the centers for
counseling.
In a previous column, we
have put the details on the specifications and costing for such a vital facility.
I still think the Church and faith-based organizations will be in a better
position to initiate and manage it at this time as support to the drug
rehabilitation center which will soon be operational but still with limited
capacity to address all the needs brought about by this enormous drug addiction
problem in our province.
The other support needed will
be the organization of a Core Training and Operations Team (CTOT) composed of
agencies and other entities with programs or projects which can be linked to drug
prevention and rehabilitation. As listed
before in previous studies and proposals, this team may include: the Provincial
Government of Bohol, the various LGUs preferable in those most affected by the
drug abuse problem, Holy Name University and other academic institutions with
psychology courses, Kasing-Sining Association, and representatives from the
Church and other faith-based organizations.
This team will require
intensive training on how to help implement the various initiatives related to
supporting the drug rehabilitation center, the ODICs or outreach facilities that
have been proposed to relieve the pressure off the pioneering facility, and to
prepare for a more systematic collaborative efforts on the part of various
sectors in carrying on the task of addressing the so-called drug menace in our
province.
This team may have an
inter-agency composition or it can be based in one agency or NGO and given the
authority with counterparts from other entities. It will have to be trained and
mobilized to produce the following outputs vital to this initial phase of an
evolving Provincial Drug Abuse Prevention and Rehabilitation Assistance Program
(DAPRAP):
-A
systematic plan for doing community-based orientation and consultation
activities in priority
areas
agreed upon with FITWBK;
-A
resource mobilization and fund raising campaign to be able to raise funds for a
working
Secretariat
and to implement key activities;
-A
clear plan on how to raise funds to enable clients from indigent families gain
access to the
services
from the Center;
-A
plan to generate support and participation from potential partners (LGUs/CSOs;
Provincial
Government;
Kasing Sining; Holy Name University; University of Bohol; BISU; and other
academic
institutions; the Catholic church and other faith-based organizations;
CSOs/NGOs;
corporations
and the business sector;
-A
plan for tapping support from the UN and international donors.
In
a society such as Bohol which is known for families and constituencies with
high
respect
for authority, the initial steps to take in the fight against drug abuse will
require a clear
call
from the leadership at family and up the hierarchy of mandated and official governance.
A
clear
and persistent call from formal and informal leaders must now be heard not only
about
arresting
drug pushers but, more importantly, in making drug abuse victims undergo
counselling
and
a recovery process eventually.
I think most people in the
province want a drug-free Bohol but they have not found a united voice to say
it. I sense that once the FITWBK and
several outreach facilities are in place, the province shall be in a better and
more effective position to launch a multi-sectoral approach to the drug
addiction problem which now threatens the present and future of most families
in our province.
Then it will be time for
our leaders and people to talk about the Bohol they want. I am sure they will
say, with few exceptions, they want a drug-free province.
For comments, email npestelos@gmail.com
NMP/06 Nov. 2015/8.03 a.m.
