Japanese Delegation Visits Last Door

Very often Last Door Recovery Society is asked by the international community to visit and learn about New West Recovery, Canada’s leading addiction recovery community.

Last Door’s youth and adult addiction treatment programs are world famous and used as an inspiration for other countries.

Today’s meeting was with:

• Takeshi Kato from Asia-Pacific Addiction Research Institute (APARI) & Drug Addiction Rehabilitation Center (DARC),
• Yohei Takahashi Attorney at Law,
• Yasuhiro Maruyama Ph.D. Associate Professor of Criminal Justice and Criminology,
• Shinichi Ishizuka Director, Criminology Research Center, Professor, Faculty of Law (University of Ryukoku)

Our Japanese guests wanted to understand how our recovery community works. Their interests were centered around 12 step meetings, long-term abstinence treatment, LBGTQ community, Vancouver Drug Court and the day to day workings of the Last Door in the community.

Understanding that our clients engage in community events, become stakeholders in local business and take roots in New Westminster all makes for greater success rates.

The group also wanted to know why the Vancouver Drug Court fails when it comes to treatment placing (courts don’t refer to recovery communities).

The group thoroughly enjoyed the visit, some of the highlights were eating lunch with the clients, eating birthday cake (singing happy birthday) and having a conversation with a clients mother about her recovery journey at Last Door.

They were also interested in learning more about Recovery Week BC  which includes the Recovery Capital Conference of Canada, and Recovery Day BC