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Stopping petrol sniffing in remote Aboriginal Australia: key elements of the Mt Theo Program
Author(s) -
PREUSS KARISSA,
BROWN JEAN NAPANANGKA
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
drug and alcohol review
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.018
H-Index - 74
eISSN - 1465-3362
pISSN - 0959-5236
DOI - 10.1080/09595230600644640
Subject(s) - sniffing , indigenous , intervention (counseling) , general partnership , psychological intervention , key (lock) , psychology , political science , criminology , psychiatry , computer security , computer science , law , ecology , neuroscience , biology
Petrol sniffing is a major form of substance misuse in Aboriginal communities across Australia. This practice has detrimental effects on the health and wellbeing of individual sniffers, their families, communities and wider society. There are few examples of programmes that have successfully stopped petrol sniffing. This paper looks at the Mt Theo Program, regularly cited as ‘the success story’ in petrol sniffing interventions. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate key elements that have contributed towards Mt Theo Program's rare achievement: (1) initially, a multi‐faceted approach including an outstation and youth programme, (2) community‐initiated, operated, owned basis of the organisation, which incorporates (3) strong partnership between Indigenous and non‐Indigenous team members and (4) an ability to operate beyond crisis intervention.