Biography:
Haraldsen graduated as MD in Bergen, Norway in 1983. He ended up becoming a general practitioner (GP), working for 15 years in Sandefjord from 1991-2006. There he was frustrated by the miserable lives of the many heroin-addicted, who eventually got his help from year 2000, outside the official, rigid Norwegian system. Then high-dosed buprenorphine became available, after having shown its effect in France for four years. There overdoses had been reduced by 79% by low-threshold, no-cost substitution by GPs, for taking at home. Co-addiction of tranquilizers (benzodiazepines) must be treated besides by slowly tapering off.
Title : Optimal Opioid Substitution Treatment OST, based on the European Union EU statistics through 30 years What to learn from diverging France and Norway