AAC's posterous

Mighty Moms

The AAC is proud to be involved with this initiative and these fine sponsors.

Hi There to all moms

Please take the time to read my mail!

I went to a event this weekend and I want to share it with all of you. MIGHTY MOMS!

As some of you will know I am the proud mother of a almost 3 year old. I have always been looking for ways to improve myself and my family to insure that Chante is brought up to be the best daughter, person and maybe some day mother that she can be.  (attached is a foto of Chante)

Well I think I found a way for not only me but for all moms, grandmothers, and moms to be out there to be all they can be and more.

Some of the things the Mighty moms movement stand for:

  • Create support through networking opportunities
  • Stand together with ONE VOICE
  • Speak in unity when there is a need to speak out i.e. serving alcohol to youngsters, porn shops in family shopping centre, etc
  • Collectively create boundaries and promote healthy values in our homes
  • Encourage unity and support between Moms
  • Collectively stand against addiction in our communities and homes
  • Encourage parents to allow the educators to educate instead of parent our children
  • Provide easy access to knowledge and information
  • To adopt the UBUNTU philosophy – United we stand, Divided we fall

Some foto’s:

Image001

I urge all of you to please come to the seminar on the 29 August at the PicknPay office park to see what it is all about!

Here is a link to there web-side for more info and a map!

 http://www.mightymom.co.za/Events.aspx

 

Below I have added some of  the sponsors only mentioning a few! If you would like to go and have problems with transport please let me know and I will help! Cell number below! And please forward to all moms that you think will benefit out of a support system like this. We all need our moms I know I do.

Final word for you:

We all know family breakdown is destroying us. Don’t talk, fix it!

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"You're mad! They'll never give up the taxes!" someone said...

 

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With reference to latest stats released by UNODC recently which indicate that;

•    Drug use in S.A. is double the world norm.

•    On average a South African consumes more litres/individual annually than anywhere else in the world.

•    15% of South Africans are problem drug users.

•    In the Northern Cape, we have the highest incidence of foetal alcohol syndrome in the world, affecting 111 children out of every 1000.

 

The point has been made that currently, S.A. is the “Addiction Capital of the World” and that we are experiencing a drug crisis. As true as this is, the most frightening crisis we actually face is this:

You may or may not be aware that Addiction as an issue in S.A. receives no funding from CSR’s and philanthropies. The reality is that addiction as a national issue is today where HIV/AIDS was 20 years ago, misunderstood, under-financed and threatening to destroy our country. However, 20 years ago there were 400 people in S.A living with HIV. According to these statistics, there are over 6.75 million South African’s living as problem drug users. A far more desperate place to be considering the lack of awareness and funding available for addiction.

The biggest challenge South Africa faces is that this issue just isn’t very popular and hence there is no funding. Corporate CSR’s & philanthropic foundations have not yet identified addiction as an issue which needs funding focus. Government perceives addiction merely as related to substances and thus The Prevention of and Treatment for Substance Abuse Bill is limited in scope to only this aspect of addiction. The Bill does not treat behaviours such as gambling, sex, pornography, over spending and the internet as addictions. Another common misperception is that addiction relates only to illegal drugs and so obviously public awareness surrounding addiction needs to be raised.

Given that they are not identified as addictions, no provision is made for them in the Bill and therefore no provision is made for tax spending on harm reduction. Oh boy, I brought up taxes. Well, this is a touchy subject because in reality South Africa is addicted to income derived from addictive products and services. What I mean is that we are dependent on the taxes collected from tobacco, alcohol and gambling. Actually most South African’s only think about the “sin” taxes generated but there’s also the vat and company’s tax on every beer that’s consumed, every cigarette that’s smoked and every Rand that’s gambled.

“You’re mad! They’ll never give up the taxes” someone said. Perhaps so, but shouldn’t we try to put ourselves in a position where we are at least less dependent on income derived from suffering? We’ve just moved from a previous regime of oppression under apartheid, only to find ourselves enslaved to addiction and the money we make from it. Something’s gotta give or should I say, someone needs to.

Addiction is also one of the main causes of the spread of HIV. It is not commonly known that people living with HIV who take anti-retrovirals and abuse substances, do not metabolise anti-retrovirals correctly and it endangers their lives. Alcohol is increasingly being recognized as a major inhibiting factor in HIV prevention. So how does one drive a public awareness campaign without funding from CSR’s and philanthropies when not even the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which is one of the largest philanthropic foundations in the world, has not even identified it and does not fund it? 

The epidemic of Addiction in South Africa actually needs to be seen as a human rights violation. Why, because 95% of South Africa's population have no access to addiction treatment because English is not their first language or treatment is simply unaffordable. The terrifying truth is that even if we were able to afford to send someone from a disadvantaged community to a rehab at a cost of around R45000, they simply would not cope with the culture of the program or the language. The consequences for most South Africans facing addiction is jails, institutions and death.

 If a man were lying in the street helpless to defend himself, and someone came along and took their wallet, it would be considered as theft wouldn’t it? Yet we allowed casinos to make over R5.5 billion last year from 5% of their gamblers. This 5% are the problem gamblers i.e. the ones who are helpless because they cannot control themselves. And how much did they give back? Less than R35 million to harm reduction initiatives that helped mainly English speaking people. By the way, the other 95% brought in about R10.6 billion which means that problem gamblers contribute to over 30% of the total revenue for the industry.

Knock, Knock!: “Who’s there?”

Answer:               ”The Addiction Action Campaign”.

Response:           ”Sorry, we have no budget, but you guys are doing a great job! Keep it up!”

And don’t assume we earn nice salaries either because so far it’s all been for love. The Addiction Action Campaign has real solutions for South Africa, but they require REAL funding. As it stands right now, we like one or two other NGO’s dealing with this issue face closure having just about enough money in the bank to pay our debit orders this month.

However don’t worry see, we’ll “Keep it up!”. Oh, and one final thought I have to offer is that we have been trying to alert the media with these statistics for over a year now, long before the super dooper UNDOC confirmed our measurements.

Certain perspectives are supported by:

·         The Social Justice Coalition (NPO) – Gavin Silber 083-777-9981

·         South Africans Against Drunk Driving S.A.D.D. (NPO) – Caro Smit 082-821-3673

·         Inerela+ (NPO) Rev. J.P. Heath 082-6974978

·         Also see The Prevention of and Treatment of Substance Abuse Bill

·         The AAC’s solution to the Bill and the crisis

 

Warren Whitfield

Chairperson

The Addiction Action Campaign

+27790663382

 

 

 

South African addiction stats at 15% not the actual crisis

According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNDOC) and the Central Drug Authority (CDA), 15% of South Africans abuse substances. This officially means that South Africa is now the “Addiction Capital of The World”.

“But this is not the real crisis” says Addiction Action Campaign (AAC) Chairperson Warren Whitfield, “The real crisis is that this figure is set to grow rapidly over the next 3 years and sadly, Corporate Social Investment (CSR) funds as well as philanthropies have not yet identified this issue for funding.”

“South Africa’s drug consumption is double the norm of the rest of the world. What’s going to make it even worse is that drugs like crystal methamphetamine or “Tik”, don’t need to be trafficked across continents and through borders anymore. Information of how to start your own “meth lab” is so freely available now that anyone with a bit of chemistry education can make it in their own back yard.” said Whitfield.

He appealed to CSR’s and Philanthropic Funding organisations to broaden the scope of funding to include addiction as a matter of urgency. He said, “If we don’t start working aggressively towards providing solutions for  the issue of addiction in South Africa, it will become the cause of more deaths than HIV/AIDS.” He said, “The AAC has real solutions available right now but we need real funding from committed partners to make them happen.”

Warren Whitfield                                            

Chairperson

The Addiction Action Campaign

064-880 NPO

Tel: +27 79 066 3382

Fax: +27 86 646 7953

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