I’M A DRUG ADDICT – PASS ME A CHEQUE! HALLELUJAH, I’M CURED!

I was amazed to read an article describing a scheme, originally pioneered in the USA, which has been proposed by the NHS’s, 'National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence' (NICE) – perhaps as in “nice work if you can get it”?.

NICE have come up with a proposal for the NHS to help cure the ‘disease’ of drug addiction. This new ‘miracle cure’ is a proposal to give sufferers of this ‘disease’ £10 gift vouchers every time they test negative for illegal drugs! Yes folks - that’s it!

Well, I might be cynical about this, but I have been proved wrong in the past. Regular readers may remember that a few years ago I was just as cynical when the UK’s education authority came up with a similar scheme to ‘cure’ youngsters who fail to attend school, of their penchant (disease?) for skiving. I know my words all those years ago have come back to haunt me, when I stated that it was one of the daftest ideas I had ever heard and that it probably qualified as singularly the daftest? Well, I’ve been proved wrong! No…. not because it did work, but because it clearly wasn’t the ‘daftest’ idea after all! This one outdoes that one!

So, I’m not going down in print to state that this is the ultimate of all daft ideas, because I have faith in the glorious system! Perhaps in the future the British government will want to take this to the next ‘logical’ level? After all, youngsters stealing cars and joy-riding is a serious issue in the UK. So why not offer youngsters money every week that they refrain from stealing a car? Perhaps they could even qualify for a gift of a car if they go for three months without joy-riding?

Then, there’s burglary. Why not offer burglars a cheque each week they refrain from burgling? I’m sure that all these schemes could be ‘proven’ by some highly paid research to be cheaper than the cost of trials and prison!

There's no end to where this idea could go!