⑯ I want to quit properly. Please help (Part 2) - 경향신문

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For people who are quitting to stop using drugs and live well, at this point in our society the most important institution is the Korea Anti-Drug Campaign Headquarters under the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety.

In the previous installment, we examined the problem of the Headquarters shining a misguided spotlight on ‘star recoverees’, and the problem of first-generation recoverees who, after receiving support from the Headquarters and expanding their influence, have formed a kind of faction centered on personal ties (See part ⑮).

Since being designated an Other Public Institution in 2024 and expanding rapidly in size, the Headquarters has been criticized for several operational issues. The operation of regional centers nationwide, established for recovery and rehabilitation, is not smooth and staffing is difficult. Work for drug addiction counseling and recovery support is overwhelmingly field-based rather than about paperwork or administrative procedures, yet the wage structure is the reverse. Senior posts employed on fixed terms are set at high salaries, while the field is maintained on woefully low pay. Questions have also been raised about the substance of counseling performance.

“Because the centers were created in such a rush, some were set up with no consideration at all for user characteristics. People with addiction are extremely sensitive to the risk of identity exposure, yet there are even centers housed in buildings that allow entry only to people whose identity has been verified. They think that if they build it, users will come, but that is not the case. The lack of understanding of the field is nothing but frustrating.”

In 2024, when the Headquarters became an Other Public Institution, drug addiction rehabilitation centers were expanded all at once to 17 metropolitan cities and provinces. Previously, there were centers only in Seoul, Busan, and Daejeon. With the large expansion, the centers were renamed ‘Together Step Centers’. However, the outward growth happened far too rapidly. Centers were opened without closely considering accessibility or user characteristics.

This official said, “There are places where centers were built in utterly unsuitable locations.” Centers created in areas with poor public transportation access can undermine the willingness of people with addiction to use them. Another official also pointed out, “We offered the view that the center location is more important than anything, but it was not well reflected,” and “The Ministry of Food and Drug Safety created the centers far too hastily.”

Lee Cheol-hee, head of the Busan Pharmaceutical Association’s Drug and Substance Addiction Prevention Center and a former auditor of the Headquarters, pointed out, “The Gyeonggi Province center is in Suwon, which is markedly inaccessible for residents of northern Gyeonggi,” adding, “With centers like this, recovery from addiction is a distant prospect.”

Haste produced mishaps. This was in Seoul, where demand for addiction recovery and rehabilitation is highest. The Ministry of Food and Drug Safety ambitiously prepared and promoted a center in Gangdong District, Seoul. Then a variable arose in the form of resident opposition. Separate from the imperative to support rehabilitation and recovery from drug addiction, social perceptions in reality still harbor strong aversion toward people with addiction. The need of the organization to promote the opening of the Seoul center ended up backfiring.

The lease term was until 2028. A deposit had already been paid and interior work was underway. The fallout from the hasty handling also reached the Gangdong District Office. Gangdong District could not ignore resident complaints. In the end, the Gangdong center was scrapped without having served a single user. They were left to keep paying rent. Gangdong District took over the lease, covering the deposit and monthly rent. The district avoided losses by re-establishing a jeonse right and renting it out to a corporation. Due to circumstances of the building owner, the contract that had been set to run until 2028 ended this February.

There is also the issue of failing to properly staff the centers. The staffing problem is largely about wages and expertise.

‘Lowest labor costs, one out of three employees resigns’. The National Assembly Health and Welfare Committee pointed out staffing management issues last year, and conditions are not much different this year. According to materials the office of Rep. Seo Mi-hwa of the Democratic Party, a member of the Health and Welfare Committee, received from the Headquarters, as of September 30 this year the average turnover rate at Together Step Centers nationwide is 12%. About one in ten employees left. According to the office of Democratic Party Rep. Heo Jong-sik, of 22 employees hired in July last year, 14 resigned without even completing eight months of service.

Making labor costs realistic had already been identified as a task in 2024. That year the Headquarters had the lowest salaries among public institutions. Yet last year the Headquarters substantially raised salaries for senior posts. Compared with lower ranks, the rate of increase was more than double. According to the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety comprehensive audit last year, pay for Grades 1 to 3 rose 3337 percent, while Grades 4 to 6 rose only 815 percent. The greater departures among lower-ranking staff who mainly oversee fieldwork are not unrelated to this.

A current Together Step Center official said, “Not only center staff but also headquarters staff change often, and directives that come down change frequently,” adding, “So many things are changing that the field is constantly scrambling to learn new directives.” Once a staff member leaves, it typically takes three to four months to fill the vacancy through a new hiring process.

“Even if a less suitable employee joins, we cannot readily let the person go. People with substance addiction often have behavior traits that are hurried and distractible. The work itself is not stable, staffing is also unstable, and headquarters directives change frequently, so workers are always anxious and on edge. In the end, service quality deteriorates.”

Field staff at the Headquarters Together Step Centers describe precarious working conditions. Illustration | Artist Kim Sang-min

Frequent vacancies and short tenures translate directly into reduced organizational capacity. Expertise does not accumulate. There is also the problem that the voices of the field are not reflected when hiring staff. The Headquarters management planning team screens candidates, but actors such as Together Step Center branch heads, who can assess ‘field expertise’, do not participate.

In this situation, moral hazard has also been observed in the Headquarters regional branches. Branches are separate regional organizations from the Together Step Centers, with 16 operating nationwide. Audit findings also revealed that branch heads ‘self-appointed’ themselves as instructors for branch staff training projects. According to data obtained by the office of Rep. Seo Mi-hwa, from February 2024, when the Headquarters was designated an Other Public Institution, to this February, 12 individuals who served as heads of eight branches appointed themselves as instructors for training projects through 359 private contracts and received a total of 341.15 million won in lecture fees. One branch head took more than 12 million won in lecture fees by this method alone.

A person involved since the early stages of the Headquarters pointed out that it has degenerated into a subordinate body that secures posts for retirees from the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety. “Since the 2010s, MFDS honorary retirees or former politicians have come in as secretary generals. It has turned into a post to take care of people. One such secretary general suddenly stopped showing up in less than a year and then resigned, and other employees did not know why. Several people who truly had a calling for recovery for those with addiction gradually left. It was a disorganized and lax organization, and then it suddenly became a very important public institution.”

A person who worked at the Headquarters for nearly 30 years also said, “The Headquarters is a courier for the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety, and the chair and the secretary general have zero hands-on experience with recovery from drug addiction,” adding, “The current board members of the Headquarters are effectively rubber stamps for Chair Seo Guk-jin, and board operations are not functioning properly.”

On the surface, the performance of the Headquarters is on a growth track. Figures in the recovery field agree that rather than focusing on numbers, the Headquarters needs to build substance.

First, the 1342 Courageous Step Center. The 1342 center provides telephone and chat counseling services for people with drug addiction. It is premised on anonymous use and operates 24 hours a day without holidays.

The number of consultations at the 1342 center more than doubled from 4,502 in 2024 to 9,178 in 2025. As of August this year, it is 5,959, and at this pace it appears likely to be around last year’s level. Although it is anonymous with user characteristics in mind, a limitation is that counselor type statistics cannot be produced. The 1342 center explains that it provides information and referrals to Together Step Centers or other rehabilitation and treatment institutions for callers, but actual referral status cannot be confirmed.

Counselors also leave frequently. A Headquarters official said, “Because it is shift work and runs on a four-team, three-shift schedule, counselor turnover is high and staff change often,” adding, “There is a continual need to train new counselors.”

Yoon Hyun-jun, head of the Addiction Recovery Alliance (adjunct professor at the Sogang University Graduate School of Public Policy), emphasized, “A 24-hour response system like the 1342 center is important,” adding, “Because it is important, it should not continue in its current state of low job continuity.” Yoon viewed that, rather than continually filling the frequently changing counselor posts with contract workers, people with addiction should be hired. “It is ideal for trained people with addiction to handle counseling. Counseling grounded in lived experience would be far more effective. Right now, counselors are actually learning from people with addiction. Ultimately, the 1342 center function needs to be strengthened further. Craving usually spikes at night. The suicide prevention hotline is linked with the fire department and police and can dispatch responders. That is where we need to go.”

The Headquarters stated that the number of cases provided by Together Step Centers nationwide for psychological tests and counseling, addiction counseling, group programs, and family programs rose from 9,988 in 2024 to 20,752 in 2025. As of September this year, it is 19,360, which, if the trend continues, suggests a performance of about 25,800 cases for the year.

These figures are not the number of users but the number of service uses. That means duplication is possible. If an individual uses a psychological test, addiction counseling, and a group program together, one person is registered as three uses. If used multiple times, the number climbs further.

To assess the real performance of the Headquarters, one should look at recovery plans established for each individual: ISP (Individual Service Plan) case management. Once registered as a case management user, follow-up management is possible and it leads to more substantive recovery support. Compared with the program provision counts announced by the Headquarters, the number of case management users drops sharply. According to data Rep. Seo Mi-hwa received from the Headquarters, case management counts were only 2,114 in 2024 and 2,109 in 2025. Looking at 2025 performance, those registered for case management accounted for only 10% of the total number of service provision cases.

The Headquarters has provided education for drug offenders since before 2024. During the government ministry-by-ministry year-end briefings last December, Chair Seo Guk-jin of the Headquarters and the responsible director stumbled while reporting to President Lee Jae Myung (See part ⑭). Education for those given prosecutorial suspension of indictment is mandatory when requested by the prosecution. Probation offices request the Headquarters to provide education (completion orders) to prevent recidivism among drug offenders. There are also lecture orders for those given suspended sentences. These figures are also announced as the Headquarters performance, but in substance they are not newly developed demand by the Headquarters; rather, they have continued in cooperation with the Ministry of Justice since the past.

A current Together Step Center official said, “Too much of the field capacity is invested in projects linked to judicial treatment.” The process involves steps such as interviews and report writing for those under completion and lecture orders, expert committee meetings, customized service referrals, and writing outcome reports, and most of the time is spent there.

This official said, “Users who come to the center because of judicial treatment mostly stop coming once they complete the orders.” Drug offenders whose trials are in progress also “stop coming once they have gathered the sentencing materials they need.” Most of the field capacity is thus consumed in managing judicially related tasks. This also means the centers are not keeping users engaged and are not presenting sustainable programs.

“It has grown in bulk, but its substance has a long way to go.”

Taken together, the Headquarters can be diagnosed this way at present. More than 20,000 people a year are drug offenders, and considering the dark figure, the estimate exceeds 600,000, yet policy still does not support addiction treatment and rehabilitation.

Korea Anti-Drug Campaign Headquarters. Yonhap News

A person with addiction who was recently given a suspended sentence told the reporter that a probation officer at the probation office saw a medical certificate bearing the word ‘addiction’ and found it surprising. The officer was unfamiliar with the idea that addiction could itself be a diagnosis. In the end, the probation officer said, “There is little perception that addiction is an illness.”

As the only public institution in the field of drug addiction, the Headquarters must improve such perceptions. It must also sort out the cartel-like order formed by particular ‘recovery-scene celebrities’ and their influence (⑭편 and ⑮편 referenced). It must abandon the old habit of fixating on numbers and instead truly save people with addiction. People from the field, not term-limited appointees or rotating civil servants, must take part in policymaking. Together Step Centers need to become places where people with addiction can remain. They must help people move toward real recovery.

Crying because they cannot quit, relapsing, being imprisoned, attempting suicide… We have met far too many people with addiction who have suffered. The Headquarters has no more time to delay.

[People Who Quit] The series is available at https://www.khan.co.kr/series/articles/as432. You can also access it via the QR code below.

※This project was supported by the Press Promotion Fund created from government advertising fees.