SINGAPORE – At 14 years old, Rahmat (not his real name) began abusing cough syrup and sleeping pills, after picking up the habit from people he played street soccer with.

He became hooked on codeine – an opioid and Class B controlled drug under the Misuse of Drugs Act. He said he downed two to four bottles of cough syrup a day.

Rahmat, 33, initially secured his supply by visiting multiple clinics to overcome limits placed on the prescription medication, which is currently 240ml per customer every four days.

Eventually, he contacted illegal sellers on messaging platforms.

“I used to hop from clinic to clinic. Then, I realised that I could go to the red-light district (in Geylang) to get the cough syrup. But it was a bit dangerous because the police were around,” he said.

“Sellers on the Telegram platform offered a delivery service. For a small fee, they could be at your home within an hour or two,” he added.

“It became way easier (to buy drugs).”

He said his cough syrup addiction led him to consume illicit substances such as Ecstasy and methamphetamine, otherwise known as Ice.

In 2020, he was diagnosed with diabetes, which he said was the result of consuming a voluminous amount of cough medicine.

Rahmat is now in his fourth stint at a drug rehabilitation centre (DRC). He is serving a 36-month sentence, which began in March 2023, for consuming Ice and absconding from a urine test.

Rahmat was one of three repeat offenders serving their sentence in DRC Institution B5 that The Straits Times spoke to in March during a visit facilitated by the Singapore Prison Service.

DRC Institution B5, which is located in Changi Prison Complex, houses drug users who have been incarcerated in DRC three times or more.

The inmates said they all started young, two of them with prescription drugs. They added that drugs and illicit substances are easier to obtain today thanks to online sellers.

The Central Narcotics Bureau released figures in February that showed there was a near 17 per cent increase in young drug abusers arrested in 2023, compared with in 2022.

In 2023, 27 per cent of all drug abusers arrested were below 30 years old.

At Institution B5, the youngest inmate is only 21 years old. Of the 958 inmates there, 24 are below 25 years old.

There are 84 inmates below the age of 25 at the DRC in Selarang Park Complex, where other male DRC inmates are held. Six of them are below the age of 20.

At Institution A4 at Changi Prison Complex, where female DRC inmates are held, 60 of them are below the age of 25, including nine who are below 20 years old.

Abused Subutex

Siva (not his real name) started on drugs when he was 24, while doing national service as a clerk. He claimed several of his fellow servicemen were experimenting with the prescription drug Subutex, and he decided to try it too.

Subutex was approved by the Ministry of Health in 2000 to treat opiate-dependent drug abusers, but some became addicted to it instead. In 2006, the drug was reclassified as a Class A controlled drug. 

Siva is on his third stint in DRC. His first conviction for drug consumption was in 2009, and he served a 12-month sentence. He has also been jailed four other times.

Before his first conviction, the 43-year-old said he tried desperately to stop.

On two separate occasions, he approached the Institute of Mental Health, where he was admitted as an in-care patient. But he could not handle the two-week-long cold turkey process, and left.

After he was released from DRC the first time, he became hooked on heroin.

He stayed clean from drugs between 2016 and 2022, during which time he got married and had a son, who is now six.

But, unable to cope with stresses in life, he returned to heroin.

He was arrested the day before Mother’s Day in 2022. He felt he had let his family down, but he is determined to change.

“When you go down, you are pulling everybody else down also. It takes a certain form of responsibility to understand that,” he said.

Like Rahmat and Siva, Kelvin (not his real name) started young.

He was 16 when he tried Ice, ketamine and Erimin, after being influenced by his friends. He was a secondary school student then.

Now 26, Kelvin said he had little supervision at home. His father was working overseas at the time, and his mother was in Thailand, where she is from.

“After a night of taking drugs, I would sleep in school if I am feeling tired. I was on drugs every night,” he said.

At 18, he was arrested for drug consumption and sentenced to seven months in DRC.

After he got out, he noticed it was easier to buy drugs – thanks to sellers on messaging platforms.

“I saw people taking drugs who were younger than when I first started. Like the age of 14,” he said.

“I think it’s because they can access drugs online. There is way more access compared with when I first started taking drugs.”

Kelvin is now on his third rehabilitation stint, after his arrest in 2023 for consuming Ecstasy and ketamine.

DRC numbers

SPS figures showed that there were 3,981 DRC inmates in 2023, including inmates released on community-based programmes.

It is the highest number of inmates since 2008, when SPS statistics were first made public.

The increase in inmate population followed amendments to the Misuse of Drugs Act in 2019, which SPS said were to allow a more calibrated approach to dealing with drug offenders.

The laws now distinguish between drug abusers who only consume drugs and those who concurrently commit other offences to harm society.

Drug abusers who only consume drugs and do not face other concurrent criminal charges are channelled to the relevant rehabilitation pathways, one of which is the DRC, SPS said.

This includes repeat drug abusers.

Those who are facing their first or second sentences at a DRC will be sent to the centre at Selarang Park, while those who face more such sentences are kept at Institution B5. The DRC detention period ranges from 12 to 48 months.

Inmates serve the tail-end of their detention in the community at halfway houses, on a day-release programme from DRC or at home via electronic tagging.

SPS said DRC inmates undergo programmes based on their assessed risk of re-offending and severity of drug use, which include employability skills training and religious programmes.

The higher-risk abusers undergo the psychology-based correctional programmes conducted by SPS’ correctional rehabilitation specialists.

The programmes emphasise relapse prevention, and allow drug abusers to practise the skills necessary for managing high-risk situations and developing strategies to overcome potential failures, such as being tempted by drugs at their workplace.

Correctional rehabilitation specialist B Gayethri said these programmes seek to address the inmates’ psychological addiction to drugs.

“Every thought that they mention (that) enables them to take drugs, we challenge and tackle them,” she said.

She added: “We give them the opportunity to tell us what is making them take the drug, and we will play devil’s advocate and push those thoughts until they cannot fight them any more.

“And then they realise they are just giving themselves excuses to keep going back.”

Superintendent of Prisons Tay San Mei, who is an officer in charge of a correctional unit at Institution B5, said there are differing needs between younger and older inmates.

Supt Tay said older inmates are more inclined to say they want to change because a lot of their time has been spent in prison.

While younger inmates may have family members onboard to assist in their reintegration and rehabilitation journey, she said one of the concerns is that they might not have the support if they keep pursuing a life of drugs.

Supt Tay said: “My concern for these young abusers is if they don’t stop (taking drugs), at some point they may end up like the elderly members we have now.

“Basically, they are left alone and no one is coming to visit them any more.”