Drug-free home stickers have now started to dot households in some parts of Bohol as part of the barangay drug-clearing campaign.
Mounting drug-free home stickers around Bohol is now on Day 5, getting positive response from the community, so far, contrary to the negative sentiments expressed when the concept was first introduced at the national level.
Complementing this is the provincial government’s Community Based Rehabilitation Program Without Walls (CBRP-WoW).
Supt. Jonathan Satentes, the operations officer at the Bohol Police Provincial Office (BPPO), said they had turned over all the stickers to the police stations all over Bohol after is launching on December 30.
The teams implementing the drug-free home stickers comprise of the police officers in the area, barangay officials and purok leaders.
A drug-free home sticker contains a code number assigned to each household in the barangay and will only be mounted on the façade of a drug-cleared residence where no family member is involved in the illegal drugs trade, either as a drug user or a drug pusher.
Households that have not yet been cleared will be assisted by the barangay officials through the Community-Based Rehabilitation Program Without Walls (CBRP-WoW) until cleared.
The Provincial Peace and Order Council approved the Implementing Rules and Regulations of the ordinance on the drug-free stickers on December 21.
Gov. Edgar Chatto made his final announcement about that the drug-free home stickers in September during the gathering of the barangay secretaries in Bohol at the Bohol Cultural Center where he made it known that the stickers by then had already been delivered to the BPPO.
Since it is being implemented at the barangay level, the provincial government initiated capacity building seminars for all barangay health workers (BHWs) and barangay nutrition scholars in batches.
The barangay secretaries had also been briefed on the CBRP-WoW in 2016 yet.
Purok leaders had also been briefed earlier on their role in the campaign.
On the part of the Provincial Social Welfare and Development Office, PSWD Officer Mita Tecson explained the mechanics of CBRP-WoW during the briefing for faith-based organizations on December 29.
During the briefing, Chatto urged members of faith-based organizations to serve as models of good behavior in their respective communities, focusing on positivity.
Chatto also emphasized that ridding households of illegal drugs does not depend on government leaders, but on the family members themselves.
The head of the family has the great influence in guiding family members to veer away from illegal drugs.
The concept of drug-free home sticker is a component of the “Oplan Hangyu” introduced by former DILG Sec. Ismael Sueno in February 2017.
Sueno suggested the drug-free home stickers after the PNP initially withdrew from the war on drugs as an alternative, being a nonviolent approach.
After about a month, the provincial government of Bohol launched the Center For Drug Education and Counselling (CEDEC) which “operates as the primary educational, psychosocial and health care provider of persons with substance use disorder (PSUD)”.
It is established based on Provincial Ordinance 14, series of 1997, creating the Provincial Anti-Drug Abuse Council (PADAC) wherein Section 10 provides for the Establishment of the Center for Drug Education and Counselling.
CEDEC, which is housed in the Oak Brook Building at Acacia Drive in the city, serves as “a friendly holistic learning and counseling center for the recovery and healing of persons with substance use disorder, living in a drug-free Boholano community”.
It offers short-term, time limited approach that includes assessment, counselling, psychotherapy and psychiatry.
It also offers crisis intervention, referral and outreach services; and designed to promote recovery through peer support, socialization, education and training.
The CEDEC program components include psychosocial services, health services, referral services, peer support group services, spiritual wellness and religious services, after-care and follow up services, and outreach services.
The provincial government also ensures the capacity development of CEDEC service providers.
Service providers are also provided with competency enhancement as to the recent trends of patient care as a continuing process in coordination with Countryside Development Program-Purok Power Movement (CDP-PPM) and CBRP-WoW.