The judiciary has a problem sentencing teen drug users as they often end up at Mount Carmel Hospital in the absence of an appropriate facility, a spokeswoman from the Social Solidarity Ministry has admitted.

She cited Madam Justice Edwina Grima who, speaking at a recent Ministry of Justice conference, said the judiciary had difficulties about where to send these teenagers.

“This is not the ideal situation,” the spokeswoman said.

The ministry was asked to react to experts’ concerns that Malta had a gaping hole in its social services provision since it lacks a facility to cater for the worrying new increase in drug users aged as young as 12 and 13. The rehabilitation centres run by NGOs such as Caritas only cater for adults.

The situation was not one which had just cropped up, the spokeswoman said.

In 2006, then executive director of Caritas Victor Grech had highlighted the fact that the NGO was encountering young people who were abusing drugs even at the tender age of eight, she continued.

There is no institution where they can be treated... We need to get them out of their homes

“Unfortunately, nothing has been done since,” she admitted.

“It is very rare to find 12- to 13-year-olds who are addicts.  They are generally drug users, not addicts, with behavioural, social and family problems.

“For this reason, they need appropriate rehabilitation which has an adequate programme to treat the needs of these teenagers, their families and environmental needs. Such programmes can contribute to their formation, train them with life skills and instil values for living in civil society.”

She said the government was currently examining international models adopted by countries with sophisticated rehabilitation programmes and facilities in order to identify effective programmes which could address the worrying situation.

At a seminar organised earlier this month, social worker Anne Marie Attard, who works in primary and secondary schools, said she was experiencing drug abuse at an increasingly tender age.

“I’m seeing 12- and 13-year-old children who are already dependent on drugs,” she said.

“There is no institution where they can be taken to be treated. It’s useless for us to have sessions with them, only for them to return home to a problematic family background where all our work is undone. We need to get these children out of their homes.”

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