Barry Hewitt said a letter sent by Eastern Health has already had positive results. (CBC)

A St. John's drug-replacement program has warned addicts they will lose access to methadone if they are charged with shoplifting at the pharmacies that serve them.

Eastern Health, which provides a methadone-replacement program to recovering addicts of OxyContin and other drugs, issued an advisory to area pharmacists in September that shoplifters would be discharged from the methadone program.

"A lot of our clients at the time were shoplifting from the community pharmacies," said Barry Hewitt, who works with the methadone program.

Hewitt, who said the decision was made in part to encourage more pharmacies to participate in the program, said the move has already had results and curbed shoplifting.

"We actually wanted to make sure that we support them and encourage new pharmacies to come on board and offer methadone," he said.

The letter says that addicts who are "discharged" from the program may still go to Eastern Health's own methadone clinic, in the Pleasantville neighbourhood of St. John's, to get their doses from Monday to Friday.

Dr. Philip Hébert, an expert on medical ethics, said Eastern Health's decision will 'make it more likely that participants will go back to their drug-seeking illicit behaviour.' (CBC)

However, no service will be offered to them on Saturdays and Sundays, because the clinic is closed on those days.

Dr. Philip Hébert, a Toronto-based physician and professor who specializes in medical ethics, said the letter appears to be a vindictive response to a medical problem.

"It's inappropriate, and in this case these are not people who are found guilty. It's if they're charged with an offence," he said.

"It's hard to believe that people who are involved in this program would have agreed to this, the health professionals."

Hewitt, though, said a physician who is part of the methadone program's team "was part of the decision-making process [that established] that this is one the policies that we would have in place."

Hébert said the policy effectively makes the pharmacist the judge and jury and puts the public at risk for robberies and other crimes that addicts may commit in order to get their fix.

"This kind of program will undermine the effectiveness of any methadone-maintenance program and make it more likely that participants will go back to their drug-seeking illicit behaviour," he said.