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A leading homeless charity says needle exchange programmes in Dublin alone attract about 10 new clients every week.
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class="MsoNormal">Merchants Quay Ireland has released details of its
annual review.
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class="MsoNormal">It also shows the group provided over
73,000 meals to homeless people last year.
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class="MsoNormal">The report said that it was clear that homelessness and addiction are still major challenges to be addressed in the Ireland of today.
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class="MsoNormal">The review also found that in 2011 they recorded
9,252 supportive interventions with service users of their homeless service which is an increase of 17% on 2010.
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class="MsoNormal">Interventions include key working sessions, referrals to emergency accommodation, social work services, medical services and social welfare services.
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class="MsoNormal">The group also supplies services
in the 4 Midlands counties of Laois, Longford, Offaly and Westmeath.
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class="MsoNormal">This is with support and funding from the Midlands Regional Drugs Task Force and the Health Service Executive (HSE).
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class="MsoNormal">CEO of the group is Tony Geoghegan.
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class="MsoNormal">He has said there was a 21% rise in
demand for free GP services.
class="MsoNormal">He believes the figures reinforce the extent of the issues facing the programme.
Read the report in full
href="http://www.mqi.ie/docs/mqi_annual_review_2011.pdf">here
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