HCM CITY - Deputy Prime Minister Truong Vinh Trong has approved a pilot project for the experimental use of methadone in HCM City and Hai Phong in an effort to mitigate the HIV/AIDS spread.

Under the deputy PM's decision, 700 drug users aged 18 and older will take part in a two-year project funded by the US Agency for International Development (USAID) and the UK Department for International Development.

Volunteers who have been on narcotics for at least two years will take an oral dose of methadone liquid as a replacement for heroin once a day.

According to the American Office of National Drug Control Policy, methadone is a rigorously well-tested medication that is safe and efficacious for the treatment of narcotic withdrawal and dependence.

Heroin releases an excess of dopamine in the body and causes users to need a constant supply of opiates to feed certain receptors in the brain.

Methadone, on the other hand, can occupy the receptor and is the stabilising factor that allows addicts on methadone to change their behaviour and discontinue heroin use.

Deputy PM Trong, who is also the chairman of the National Committee for the Prevention and Control of AIDS, Drug Abuse and Prostitution, asked the Ministry of Health to work with the two cities' People's Committees to closely control the project's implementation.

The health ministry will report to the prime minister for further application of the drug.

Le Truong Giang, deputy director of the HCM City Department of Health, said that to curb the spread of HIV, methadone could not be used alone but must be accompanied with education.

Drug users who must visit a health care clinic every day to receive the dose would have more opportunities to interact with educators who could help them return to a normal life, he said.

According to the committee, more than 280,000 people were infected with the deadly HIV virus last year in Viet Nam, double the figure in 2000.

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