Troy Whitehead has been smoking ice for 10 years. The ex-navy serviceman and oil rig worker used it to block emotions he said he didn’t understand.

“It's like a demon inside of me, I'm a good person but on that it completely changes me,” he said.



The 28-year-old from Mount Lawley is one of a growing number of West Australian addicts turning to Thailand for help.

The island of Koh Chang, 350 kilometres south-east of Bangkok, has become the new go-to destination for Aussie addicts hoping to get clean.

Last year alone 100 Australians, most of them ice users from WA, travelled to DARA (Drug and Alcohol Rehabilitation Asia) a former five-star resort on the island, trying to kick their habit.

“We treat all addictions, drug addictions, people who come through for gambling, for sex addiction,” said Luke Molloy, a counsellor from New South Wales who has been working at DARA for 18 months.

The centre is a place where a team of international medical and addiction specialists deliver behavioural therapy and counselling, strict exercise and diet regimes, in picture-perfect surrounds.

Director Dr Philip Townshend says run-down and underfunded treatment facilities in western countries had led many addicts to look overseas for help.

He calls it rehab tourism.



“In a place like Thailand we can do the hotel costs really cheaply, the therapy stuff is exactly the same as you'd get anywhere else,” Dr Townshend said.

Troy Whitehead said DARA was his sanctuary. He spent thousands of dollars on counselling in Perth, treatment he said didn’t help.

When he was told he’d have to wait six months for a place in a residential rehabilitation facility he booked himself into DARA.



“When you’re ready to be fixed, it’s right then and there, you’ve got a gap, it’s not long, because if I didn’t come here and I had to wait six months, I’d probably be dead,” he said.

Rebecca Abercrombie, 19, from Melbourne said it was the cost that made Thailand so appealing.

An ice addict since the age of 12, she said her parents couldn’t afford treatment in Australia but managed to scrape together the $7,000 needed for a month at DARA.

“A lot of it isn’t government subsidised and you pay for a lot of it yourself and it’s very, very, very expensive,” she said.



Dr Dr Townshend said a private treatment in Australia coulod cost $130,000 for a month.

An average day at DARA consists of yoga and flexibility classes, group and one-on-one counselling, personal training sessions, massage therapy and healthy eating options.

“We try to approach their problems or issues from a holistic perspective,” Mr Molloy said.



He said the stigma of addiction in Australia had led to a chronic underfunding of treatment facilities at a time when it was needed most.

“We do need more beds in Australia, we do need a greater degree of access to health facilities and support that doesn’t stigmatise and punish people and label them as criminals but supports them and helps them return to a healthy recovery.”

https://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/wa...eak-addiction/