In 1960, the colony’s antinarcotics units set what they believe to be
a world record for drug seizures, grabbing 39 shipments that included
3,626 pounds of opium, 153 pounds of morphine, 337 pounds of morphine
hydrochloride, 5 pounds of heroin and 155 pounds of barbitone. On
November 30, 1960, the Preventive Service captured 1,078 pounds of raw
opium hidden in bundles of hollowed-out teakwood on a newly arrived ship.
Less than two weeks later they discovered another vessel trying the same
trick and made a haul of 769 pounds of raw opium, 16 pounds of prepared
opium, 45½ pounds of morphine and 293 pounds of morphine hydrochloride.
There were 50 seizures in 1961, putting a further serious crimp in the
smuggling racket.
Feeling persecuted and hurt, many smugglers shifted their base of
operations to Singapore. Even so, it was not an unqualified triumph for
Hong Kong’s antinarcotics force; by pinching off the drug supply they
forced its market price sky-high, and desperate addicts began stealing
and robbing to pay for their dope.
Halting the manufacture of heroin within the colony is as difficult as
catching dope smugglers. A heroin “factory” requires little space and
can be set up in some obscure corner of the New Territories or lodged in
an expensive top-floor apartment on Hong Kong Island; the profit margin
is so great that production costs are but a small obstacle. Enforcement
costs are almost as steep. In 1959, the Preventive Service trebled its
manpower. In February, 1961, maximum penalties for drug manufacturing
were raised from a fine of $8,750 and ten years in prison to a $17,500
fine and life imprisonment.
Almost two-thirds of all prisoners in Hong Kong jails are drug addicts,
but the jailing of addicts, however necessary to protect society, offers
no cure for addiction. The colony government has sought to meet this
phase of the problem by setting up a narcotics rehabilitation center at
Tai Lam Chung Prison and a voluntary treatment section in the government
hospital at Castle Peak.
Dr. Alberto M. Rodrigues, a colony-born physician of Portuguese ancestry
and an unofficial member of the Hong Kong Legislative Council, became
chairman of a voluntary committee formed in 1959 to help drug addicts.
With government approval, his committee took over Shek Kwu Island near
Lantau in 1960 to establish a center where about 500 addicts could be
accommodated if they volunteered for treatment. The island was chosen
because it was isolated, and with proper security measures, could keep
the addict entirely away from drugs until medical and nursing care had
put him back on his feet. Gus Borgeest, the refugee rehabilitation
pioneer who established a welfare center on Sunshine Island, helped in
the early planning of Shek Kwu Chau, which began operations during 1962.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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