DRT/MAT as it Relates to NA: Helping Members Take Root

For a workshop outline on this topic and information on the other Issue Discussion Topics this cycle, visit na.org/idt/current-issue-discussion-topics/

Background
We’ve been having conversations around drug replacement therapy or medication assisted treatment (DRT/MAT) for decades, but we don’t have a unified Fellowship position on this issue. Many groups still struggle with how to respond to addicts on medication assisted treatment. It’s important that we have these conversations because it’s not going away; medication is a part of treatment more and more of the time. Whatever our individual feelings might be, we need to consider how we carry the message and further our primary purpose in the world we live in.

Why are we having this conversation?
We have consensus as a Fellowship that our message is hope and the promise of freedom. We are a program of complete abstinence. We want NA to be a safe place to recover. And we want people to be able to choose NA membership no matter how they get here.

We have had conversations as a Fellowship about how we make people feel welcome at their first meetings. We need to go deeper and consider what it means to be a member, what it took for each of us to take root in Narcotics Anonymous, and how we support others in finding their way to membership.

In the Third Tradition, IWHW reminds us that “the groups are not the jury of desire… no addict should be denied an opportunity to stay long enough to develop that desire… we are asked to extend to others the care and concern that helped each of us find a sense of belonging.”