Drugs minister claims breakthroughs in treatment reforms despite years of delays

dailyrecord.co.uk:

Public health chiefs have claimed a big improvement in the implementation of drug treatment reforms that were branded a “disaster” a year ago.The controversial Medication Assisted Treatment Standards are two years behind schedule but are now being adhered to more closely by all Alcohol and Drug partnerships in Scotland.Bosses of ADPs were warned by then drugs minister Angela Constance 12 months ago that their jobs were at threat if they failed to ensure the rights-based reforms were not offered to anyone asking for treatment for addiction.But the update announced yesterday by Public Health Scotland reflected progress, with the first five of ten MAT Standards being implemented in 66 per cent of Scotland’s 29 ADPs.Last year the figure was a miserable 17 per cent and political opponents yesterday claimed that today’s situation represents a scarcely better performance.For the remaining five standards, 88% were partially implemented.Current drugs and alcohol policy minister Elena Whitham claimed the progress will help bring down our nation’s shocking drug death rate, which is the worst in Europe and has shown signs of rising again recently.

But she did acknowledge that major improvement is needed, with a third of ADPs failing to implement the first five MAT StandardsWhitham said: “We now know that MAT Standards numbers one to five were implemented in two thirds of ADP areas, which is a huge increase on where we were at last year.“So services are starting to implement the systems and cultural change that’s needed to drive forward the change.

But we accept there is still a lot of work to do.”The first five MAT Standards include a pledge to offer on-the-day treatment, as well as allowing patients to choose whether they want