Alcoholics have many options for help

In the wake of the public outcry against increasing incidents of drunk driving, the National Drug Abuse Control Council has launched an awareness campaign to highlight its prevention and education programmes. According to officials of NDACC’s Orange Walk branch, alcoholism is a dirty little family secret in many Belizean homes and that silence is costing lives. Tonight, NDACC’s Victor Pollard maintains that if you or someone close to you needs help, there is no shortage of options.

Victor Pollard, National Drug Abuse Control Council, O.W.
“It’s not only the person who is abusing alcohol that is living in denial so to speak, it’s our whole country, it’s the whole world because we will never learn until someone else dies from another accident, because the laws of course have to be enforced. In Orange Walk and in Belize, we have a very good programme because we are working with the police at the community level and with the Magistrate. We have a referral programme that goes through the psychiatric clinic and they meet the professional people there, the doctors of psychiatry and then they would be referred to NDACC and we do some sort of evaluation and assessment and counselling and further referrals to programmes such as to the Alcoholics Anonymous. And we have committed people in the Alcoholics Anonymous who have maintained as they say sobriety over the years and they serve as role models and good examples because they too were on the streets driving drunk.”

In Orange Walk, the A.A. club “Primero de Mayo” meets Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday nights from seven to nine on Cemetery Street just off Main Street. For more information on the time and the location of A.A. groups or narcotics abuse meetings near you please contact Karen Bodden at the NDACC Belize City office located near the K.H.M.H. It is worth noting that while alcoholism is a major problem in Belize, many of the drunk drivers on our roads are not necessarily chronic alcoholics.