Decades After Alcohol Ban, Iran Admits It Has a Problem

Decades After Alcohol Ban, Iran Admits It Has a Problem
Whenever I would feel pressure, I would get a bottle
and drink it." Mr. Konjedi’s wife, Samin — they met through A.A. — said she needed at least two meetings a day to prevent her from taking up the bottle.
The relaxing of prohibition has allowed addicts like Mehdi to emerge from the shadows
and embrace a new circle of friends — recovering alcoholics — who greeted him as he entered a West Tehran apartment one recent evening.
Aware Anonymous said that I constantly need a dose to cure my disease.
Reza Konjedi said that These days there is so much alcohol available, simply punishing everybody and using force is no longer working,
Since 2015, when the Health Ministry ordered addiction treatment centers to care for alcoholics, dozens of private clinics
and government institutions have opened help desks and special wards for alcoholics.
Bootlegging is also a major problem; dozens of people die from alcohol poisoning every year after consuming
low-quality moonshine — 135 in 2013, the latest year for which official statistics are available.