SARAWAK Tourism, Arts, Culture, Youth and Sports Minister Abdul Karim Hamzah said the state’s fight against drugs is not helped by federal lawmakers’ failure to support its push for regulatory laws to curb glue sniffing and the abuse of non-scheduled drugs.

Karim said tyre repair glue and hallucinatory medicines like Nospan and Codeine were a gateway for youths to “start their life in drugs”.

The items were readily available and safe, he said, because there currently are no laws that make their possession an offence.

When taken in large doses, anti-depressant Nospan and cough syrup Codeine give a hallucinatory effect.

“Federal lawmakers might think glue sniffing is trivial, too small a matter because they have (bigger) drug problems (in the peninsula).

“They might say, ‘what is glue sniffing’, ‘what is taking cough medicine’ and brush them off as too small.”

Karim said it might be trivial in other states, but the problem should be contained before it escalates.

“We have to nip everything in the bud.

“We have to stop them (the youth) from even trying out,” he said after the state Drug Prevention Association of Malaysia (Pemadam) coordination meeting in Kuching.

“That’s where they start their drug life. When they are introduced to something bigger, they go further.”

Pemadam is a non-governmental organisation that caters to the welfare of former drug addicts.

Karim said the state will keep pushing for the regulations, adding he will raise the issue again at Pemadam’s annual general meeting in Kuching later this year.

“I raised it at the last AGM in Langkawi and I will raise it again here in Kuching.”

Despite being one of three states in the country with low rates of drug abuse, a leaked Education Ministry study last year identified 10 schools in the state as “hot spots for disciplinary and drug problems”.

The schools were in Kuching, Padawan, Bau, Sri Aman, Miri, Baram, Lawas, Simunjan, Samarahan and Bintulu.

In April, a random urine test was carried out by the Anti-Drugs Agency (AADK) on 99 secondary students in four schools in Lawas. Four out of 23 of them tested positive for drugs.

The most northern district of Lawas is considered the state’s most drug problematic area due to its proximity to Sabah which is a conduit for syabu smuggled from the Philippines. – March 22, 2018.