Shortages and rising prices of addiction treatment medicines are disrupting care for many people with substance dependence in Iran, raising concerns that patients could relapse or turn to more dangerous drugs, a former addiction treatment official said on Thursday.
"The shortage of opium tincture has become one of the most serious challenges facing addiction treatment centers," Saeed Safatian, a former treatment director at Iran's Drug Control Headquarters, told ILNA.
Supplies of opium tincture, one of the three main medicines used in Iran's addiction treatment system alongside methadone and buprenorphine, have fallen sharply in recent months.
Safatian linked the shortages to reduced availability of raw opium following the Taliban's ban on poppy cultivation in Afghanistan and said authorities had failed to prepare adequately despite years of warnings about potential supply disruptions.
Proposals to cultivate opium domestically for pharmaceutical purposes and efforts to secure imports from countries including India and Turkey failed to materialize, leaving treatment providers with few options, according to Safatian.
The shortages have fueled concerns among addiction specialists that patients unable to obtain prescribed medicines could return to the illicit drug market.
"Nearly one million patients depend on maintenance treatment with opium tincture across the country, but treatment centers in more than 15 provinces have faced shortages or suspension of their medicine allocations," Ali Ahmadi, deputy head of Tehran province's addiction treatment providers association, said earlier during a protest by treatment providers outside the Health Ministry.
A worker at an addiction treatment center told Iran International in January that he had received no support from the State Welfare Organization despite a decade of operating a treatment facility. The revocation of licenses for some centers had also pushed many patients toward methadone treatment, he said.
The effects of the shortages became apparent in 2023 and intensified in 2025, when some treatment centers were able to provide opium tincture to only a fraction of patients seeking it, Safatian said.
He warned that some users could shift to methamphetamine or combine multiple substances, making treatment more difficult and increasing health, social and economic harms.
Shortages of opium tincture, methadone and other addiction medicines, he said, could continue in the coming months if problems securing raw materials and foreign currency persist, adding to pressure on Iran's addiction treatment system.
Accounts from several provinces described children and teenagers taking part in checkpoint operations and handling weapons at state-sponsored gatherings, despite international conventions that call on governments to keep minors away from military and security activities.
“Recession, inflation, poverty and hardship are rampant, and this is a sign of economic collapse,” a resident of Fereydunkenar, north of Iran, said. “They have set up checkpoints with children aged 10 to 12 and gather people around city squares with food and payments to show strength.”
A resident of Tehran province described what he said was the growing presence of minors at checkpoints in Shahriar, near Tehran.
“Almost all the checkpoints in Shahriar are run by children under 16 holding flashlights. It is truly absurd,” the resident wrote.
Military training at public gatherings
Citizens also described state-organized events where children were given access to firearms and military training activities.
A resident of Tehran said children had been deployed at checkpoints during public events and that authorities had also set up stations distributing tea and refreshments.
Similar accounts emerged from other parts of the country.
“At the entrance to Bastak in Hormozgan province, they hand rifles to children every night,” one resident said.
Another citizen from Kelardasht in Mazandaran province reported seeing children being taught how to handle weapons.
Long history of youth mobilization
The use of minors in military and security-related activities has a long history in the Islamic Republic.
During the Iran-Iraq War, thousands of teenagers were sent to the front lines, and many were killed in military operations. In the decades that followed, military-oriented instruction continued through school programs such as “Defensive Readiness” classes and student Basij activities.
Student Basij organizations and university Basij branches have for years operated within educational institutions, recruiting young people into structures linked to the security establishment.
Human rights advocates argue that linking formal education with military and paramilitary activities risks normalizing violence and militarization among children and adolescents.
Iran is a party to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which requires states to protect children from involvement in military activities and provide a safe environment for their development and education.
Expansion of military imagery
The reports coincide with a broader increase in the public display of military equipment across Iran.
In recent months, images have circulated showing missiles, military hardware, Revolutionary Guards speedboats and light and heavy weapons displayed in public spaces, schools, state-organized gatherings and media programs.
Child rights advocates view such measures as part of a wider effort to normalize the presence of weapons in children's daily lives and to militarize public space.
The growing involvement of children and teenagers in government-organized activities, checkpoints and military programs may also reflect efforts to cultivate future generations of ideologically aligned supporters and security personnel, according to critics of the policy.
A government employee in Dorud, in western Lorestan province, said a monthly salary of 20 million tomans, about $115 at the current rate, no longer covered basic needs.
“Half of this wage goes to rent, and the other half goes to medicine and doctors,” the message said. “Nothing is left for food and clothing.”
Another message said a salary below 50 million tomans, about $287, could no longer support a family of four, while one person said only three million tomans, about $17, remained from their monthly pay by the end of the month.
“With this situation, we have to fill ourselves with bread and water,” the message said.
Healthcare costs were also cited as a growing burden. A 51-year-old resident of Isfahan said an orthopedic visit cost one million tomans, about $6, and two prescribed scans would have cost four million tomans, about $23, each.
“I did not have the money, so I gave up,” the resident said.
Another message said medicine had become scarce and sharply more expensive, while insurance covered almost none of the costs of visits, treatment or tests. A monthly prescription that previously cost 200,000 tomans, about $1, had risen to 1.35 million tomans, about $8, the message said.
A separate message from Isfahan said most autism centers in the city had raised fees by 80%, leaving them far less crowded.
Others pointed to daily goods becoming unaffordable, citing a simple ice cream at 80,000 tomans, about 46 cents, and a 1.5-liter bottle of water at 35,000 tomans, about 20 cents.
“This is no longer inflation,” one message from Shahreza said. “It is swelling and bruising.”
