Ministry of Food and Drug Safety's Narcotics Safety Planning Officer Regularized... Strengthening Full-Cycle Management

Ministry of Food and Drug Safety CI
[Photo by Ministry of Food and Drug Safety]

[Asia Economy Reporter Lee Chun-hee] The Narcotics Safety Planning Office at the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety, which has been operating as a temporary organization, will be formalized as a regular department.

On the 31st, the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety announced that the Narcotics Safety Planning Office was finally decided to be regularized following the evaluation by the Ministry of the Interior and Safety for newly established organizations. The presidential decree, "Organization of the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety and Its Affiliated Agencies," will be revised next month to formalize the office. The position will maintain its current director-general level.

The Ministry of Food and Drug Safety established the Narcotics Safety Planning Office as a temporary director-general level organization in April 2019 to alleviate public concerns about narcotics.

The Narcotics Safety Planning Office has served as the secretariat agency for the "Narcotics Countermeasures Council," a vice-ministerial level meeting of related ministries chaired by the Office for Government Policy Coordination. Through this, it has performed comprehensive coordination and management of inter-ministerial cooperation related to narcotics safety management, analyzed narcotics handling information to prevent misuse and abuse, and operated an illegal narcotics monitoring system.

With this formalization, the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety plans to accelerate the implementation of a new narcotics policy paradigm that encompasses not only strengthening narcotics crackdown and punishment but also enhancing addiction treatment, social rehabilitation and linkage, and customized prevention education tailored to specific groups, covering prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation altogether.

Currently, only two addiction rehabilitation centers operate nationwide; the ministry plans to add one more center this year and, in the long term, expand to all 17 metropolitan cities and provinces. Through this, it aims to expand counseling, education, and rehabilitation programs related to addiction for individuals suffering from narcotics addiction and their families.

Additionally, there are plans to develop customized rehabilitation programs based on drug and individual characteristics and to create a Korean-style social rehabilitation model.

The ministry will establish an inter-ministerial linkage system to share independently managed information such as medication data and treatment rehabilitation education completion status, building an organic support system from correction and treatment to social rehabilitation.

In terms of prevention, customized prevention education programs targeting students, youth, and other groups will be developed, and existing lecture-style education will be converted to participatory formats to expand and strengthen prevention education.

Meanwhile, the temporary narcotics designation period will be shortened from the current 52 days to 40 days to swiftly block the influx of new narcotics, and prescription statistical information will be provided more systematically to allow medical institutions to check for excessive prescriptions of medical narcotics. The current narcotics safety management system will also be improved.

Oh Yu-kyung, Commissioner of the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety, said, "Based on the formalization of the Narcotics Safety Planning Office, we will further strengthen the government's narcotics safety management system," adding, "We will establish a virtuous cycle safety management system covering the entire process from narcotics prevention and education, crackdown and punishment, to addiction treatment and social rehabilitation."