SUBSTANCE abuse has emerged as one of the most serious but insufficiently addressed public health and social challenges confronting Kano State today. What was once considered a marginal problem confined to a small segment of society has now become a widespread issue affecting adolescents, young adults, families, and communities across both urban and rural areas. The consequences extend far beyond individual health, touching on crime, insecurity, productivity loss, family breakdown, and increasing pressure on already stretched health and social systems.
The Scale of the Problem
Nigeria has one of the highest burdens of substance use in Africa. According to the National Drug Use Survey (2018), an estimated 14.3 million Nigerians aged 15–64 years had used drugs within the preceding year, with approximately 3 million suffering from drug use disorders requiring treatment. Northern Nigeria, including Kano State, contributes significantly to this burden due to a combination of demographic, economic, and social factors.
In Kano, commonly abused substances include cannabis, tramadol and other opioids, codeine-based cough syrups, inhalants such as solvents, and increasingly synthetic stimulants such as methamphetamine. These substances are associated with a wide range of harms, including dependence, psychosis, depression, violence, accidents, and premature death. Hospitals and psychiatric facilities in the state continue to report increasing presentations of substance-induced mental disorders, often among young men in their most productive years.
Social and Economic Drivers
Substance abuse in Kano does not occur in isolation. It is closely linked to youth unemployment, poverty, rapid urbanization, overcrowded living conditions, school dropout, family disintegration, and lack of recreational and economic opportunities. For many young people, drugs become both a coping mechanism and an entry point into cycles of crime, ill health, and social exclusion.
Families bear a heavy burden. Parents and caregivers struggle with the emotional, financial, and social consequences of having a family member with substance use disorder. Communities experience increased insecurity, while the state absorbs indirect costs through lost productivity, policing, incarceration, and healthcare expenditures.
Medical Perspective of Substance Abuse
Substance use disorder is best understood through the medical model, which recognizes it as a chronic, relapsing but treatable brain disorder, rather than a moral failure or lack of willpower. Repeated exposure to psychoactive substances produces measurable changes in brain circuits responsible for reward, motivation, impulse control, and decision-making, reducing an individual’s ability to stop use despite harmful consequences. Like other chronic medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes, substance use disorders require early diagnosis, evidence-based treatment, long-term follow-up, and relapse prevention, not punishment or social exclusion. Adopting the medical model is essential for reducing stigma, improving treatment outcomes, and guiding policy toward care rather than criminalization.
The Treatment Gap
Despite the scale of the problem, access to effective, evidence-based treatment for substance use disorders remains severely limited. Internationally accepted treatment approaches include early screening, brief interventions, psychosocial therapies, medication-assisted treatment for opioid use disorders, harm reduction services, and structured long-term recovery support. In Kano State, however, several gaps persist:
• Limited number of specialized treatment facilities, Federal Neuropsychiatric Hospital, Dawanau, Kano and The Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital, Kano which are overstretched
• Inadequate integration of substance use services into primary and secondary healthcare, resulting in missed opportunities for early intervention
• Shortage of trained mental health and addiction professionals
• Heavy reliance on out-of-pocket payments, making care unaffordable for many
• Proliferation of unregulated traditional or faith-based treatment centres, some of which lack medical oversight and operate outside accepted human-rights standards
As a result, many individuals with substance use disorders remain untreated or receive inappropriate care, leading to frequent relapse, repeated hospital admissions, or incarceration.
Prevention: The Most Cost-Effective Strategy
Unfortunately, the substance abuse response space has also been flooded with well-intentioned but poorly informed prevention efforts led by untrained NGOs, community-based organizations, and public commentators. Many of these initiatives rely on fear-based messaging, public shaming, exaggerated claims, or moralistic lectures, none of which are supported by scientific evidence. Research consistently shows that such approaches may be ineffective or even counterproductive, sometimes increasing curiosity, stigma, and resistance among young people. Without basic grounding in public-health principles and addiction science, these interventions risk wasting scarce resources while creating a false sense of action. Effective prevention must be competence-driven, evidence-based, and professionally guided, not left to improvisation or sensational commentary. Evidence-based prevention strategies include:
• School-based life-skills education, focusing on decision-making, emotional regulation, and peer resistance skills
• Family-based interventions, particularly parenting programmes that promote supervision, communication, and early childhood development
• Community-level interventions, including youth engagement, vocational training, and social protection measures
• Public awareness campaigns that provide accurate information and counter myths without stigmatization
When adapted to local cultural and religious contexts, these interventions have been shown to reduce substance use and its associated harms. Kano State, with its strong community and faith structures, is well-positioned to implement culturally appropriate prevention programmes if properly coordinated and funded.
Why Kano Needs a State SAMHSA
One of the most critical weaknesses in Kano’s current response is fragmentation. Responsibilities for drug control, prevention, treatment, rehabilitation, and social reintegration are spread across multiple ministries, departments, and agencies, often with overlapping mandates but limited coordination.
The establishment of a Kano State Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Agency (Kano SAMHSA) (as was done recently in the neighbouring Kaduna State) would provide a central coordinating body to address this challenge. Such an agency would:
• Coordinate prevention, treatment, rehabilitation, and recovery services across sectors
• Develop and enforce minimum standards and quality assurance mechanisms for treatment centres
• Support training and capacity building of healthcare and social service workers
• Promote data collection, research, and monitoring to inform policy and planning
• Facilitate collaboration with federal institutions, civil society organizations, traditional leaders, and development partners
Importantly, a Kano SAMHSA would help shift the response to substance abuse from a predominantly punitive model to a public health and social care approach, consistent with global best practice.
The Legal Framework: Adapting the Mental Health Act 2023
Nigeria’s Mental Health Act 2023 represents a major milestone, providing a modern, rights-based framework for mental health and substance use care. However, because health is a concurrent responsibility, effective implementation requires state-level domestication and adaptation.
For Kano State, adapting this Act into a state mental health law would:
• Protect the rights and dignity of persons with mental and substance use disorders
• Provide clear legal guidance on voluntary and involuntary admission and treatment, preventing abuse
• Regulate both public and private treatment facilities, including traditional centres
• Enable structured financing, oversight, and accountability
Anchoring a Kano SAMHSA within such a legal framework would ensure sustainability, legitimacy, and public trust.
Conclusion
Substance abuse in Kano State is no longer a hidden or peripheral issue; it is a major public health, social, and developmental challenge. The costs of inaction—measured in broken families, lost productivity, insecurity, and preventable deaths—are enormous. Yet the evidence is clear: effective prevention, accessible treatment, strong institutions, and sound legal frameworks work.
By closing treatment gaps, investing in evidence-based prevention, adapting the Mental Health Act 2023, and establishing a Kano State SAMHSA, Kano can protect its youth, strengthen families, and build a healthier, more productive society. The choice before policymakers is clear. The time to act is now.
- Salihu is a Consultant Psychiatrist and Public Mental Health Advocate. He currently serves as Medical Director of the Federal Neuropsychiatric Hospital, Dawanau, Kano, and is an Associate Professor of Psychiatry with interests in substance abuse policy and mental health systems development.