Egypt, UAE cooperate over drugs combating

CAIRO, 19 September 2019: The Social Solidarity Ministry's Addiction Treatment and Abuse Fund Thursday signed a cooperation protocol with the UAE's National Rehabilitation Center to carry out a group of programs to treat drug addicts.

The protocol was signed by director of the fund Amr Othman and director of the UAE center Hamad Ghafari.

The protocol aims at exchanging expertise between the two sides as regards the psychological and social rehabilitation of addicts and addicts' family counselling.

Social Solidarity Minister Ghada Walli, who attended the signing ceremony, said the protocol aims at honing the skills of cadres operating in the drug addiction treatment in accordance with the latest techniques and programs applied in this domain.

She lauded the role of the UAE center in decreasing the number of drug addicts.
As part of this cooperation, the ministry is looking forward to setting up a new addiction treatment center in Egypt in light of the successful experiment of the UAE center.

Walli also referred to the success of Egypt's drug addiction hotline, 16024, that offers treatment, counselling and rehabilitation services to 100,000 persons annually in 14 governorates.