Measures that have been successfully undertaken outside prison with government funding and support, such as making…methadone maintenance available to injection drug users, are not being undertaken in Canadian prisons, although other prison systems have shown that they can be introduced successfully, and receive support from prisoners, staff, prison administrations, politicians, and the public. (p. 65, Italics in original)

Benefits of Methadone Maintenance Therapy (MMT)

Having now demonstrated that there are, in fact, substantial financial incentives to expanding the availability of MMT programs in federal prisons in Canada, this article will now critically discuss the various benefits that they provide. These benefits include but are not limited to: general benefits, combating HIV, AIDS and Hepatitis C, reducing crime rates and criminal behaviour, reducing heroin use, and benefits of MMT when it is accompanied by additional treatment.

General Benefits. Numerous scientific studies have revealed a multitude of benefits that MMT provides. One very important finding is that the health of long-term MMT patients is not negatively compromised, even after twenty or thirty years of use. (Zaric, Brandeau and Barnett 2000).

According to Ontario Region Health Services (1998), the general benefits provided by MMT include:

• decreased illegal activity;
• increased employment;
• reduced illicit drug use;
• improved health status; and
• increased cost-effectiveness (pp. 1-2).

Combating HIV, AIDS and Hepatitis C. The first specific benefit that will be discussed in this article is the impact that MMT has in combating HIV, AIDS and Hepatitis C infections among the IDU community. To begin, the expansion of existing MMT programs in federal prisons is a cost-effective health care intervention, as illustrated above. In fact, researchers have found that MMT can play an important role in slowing the spread of HIV and improving the length and quality of life for IDU’s, even in populations with low HIV prevalence among IDU’s (Zaric, Brandeau and Barnett 2000). Accordingly, long-term health care costs are substantially reduced, and the funds saved can be re-allocated as required.

Indeed, the expansion of existing MMT programs in federal prisons in Canada has been recommended by many “as an AIDS-prevention strategy that provides people dependent on drugs with an additional option for getting away from needle use and sharing. The main aim of MMT is to help people get off injecting, not off drugs.” (Jürgens 2002:34, italics in original). One such expansion of MMT programs was realized in Australia, where “[m]easures introduced to combat the spread of AIDS…[resulted in] changes in national and state policy towards drug abuse such that the highest priority has been given to the containment of HIV” (CCSA 1996:4).

Certainly, the reasons for expanding access to MMT programs in federal prisons in Canada are compelling. First, IDU inmates continue injecting while incarcerated and are more likely to share injection equipment, thereby generating a high risk of HIV transmission (Jürgens 2002). Second, “as in the community, MMT, if made available to prisoners, has the potential of reducing injecting and syringe sharing in prisons”
(p. 36). Finally, researchers have revealed the positive effect that MMT has in reducing HIV, AIDS and Hepatitis C infections among the IDU community (Simoens, Matheson, Inkster, Ludbrook and Bond 2002).