Judge Peter Moss has given a hard criticism against the drug rehabilitation for criminal offenders. He is stating that less than half of the offenders complete the courses they are given, and can’t think of almost any drug rehab programs that have been successful for them.

Moss has a suggestion that he thinks would be the best for addicted criminals. That would be a abstinence-based rehabilitation. “The most appropriate way to deal with drug addicted criminals is to provide robust, abstinence-based rehabilitation which we know is most effective.”

Although he criticizes the current rehab system, he has been giving sentences considering this option. He tells this group of offenders is hard to work with, but the number of offenders who completes the rehab has risen from 28% to 43% in five years.

According to a new study long-term drug treatment gives the best results when treating young people with addiction to opioid prescription painkillers. The study focused on 152 oioid addicts between the ages of 15 to 21 for 12 weeks.

The first group took the drug Suboxone for a period of 9 weeks, and then stopped taking it after 12 weeks. The second group took a lower dose of the drug, for only a period of two weeks. After 8 weeks went by, only 23% of those on the drug had positive urine tests which showed they have been using again.

The leader of the study, Dr. George Woody of the University of Pennsylvania, states that currently majority of the treatment programs in the U.S. are on a short-term set-up. The problems these young people are facing are tried to be fixed over a short period of time through detoxification.