Narconon Astore Celebrates 19 Years of Saving Lives

Since the day it opened its doors in 1994, the Narconon Astore drug rehabilitation program has been providing effective and lasting help to Italians addicted to drugs and alcohol. In celebration of the center’s 19th anniversary, more than 150 people, graduates, staff and family members, gathered for an event in June of this year. The guests enjoyed food, flowers and festive decorations while they socialized and listened to speeches from graduates, families and prominent public figures from throughout the region. Of special interest during the celebration were the 35 success stories that were shared by people who had graduated from this and other Narconon centers in Italy. These stories included reports from some of the speakers of having enjoyed stable sobriety for a full 30 years since they graduated the Narconon program. The emotional impact created by the stories was enormous for most of those in attendance, people who had themselves been on the brink of ruin during their own fight with drug addiction prior to finding Narconon. For family members in the audience the stories carried comparable weight, given that they had nearly lost their loved ones to the devastation of drug use.

The Narconon Astore facility is ideally situated in the central region of Italy, near the city of Fabriano and close to the coast of the Adriatic Sea. Given its location in the mid-part of the country, Italians from all around can conveniently reach the facility. The center is located within the confines of a protected national park, surrounded by lush, pristine woods and green pastures. It provides students with a serene setting in which they can decompress from the stress and pressure of everyday life, focus on their efforts to recover from addiction and enjoy themselves without the use of drugs. There is an outdoor park that is equipped for sports, entertainment and leisure activities, along with two swimming pools, a tennis court, facilities for soccer and volleyball, and ample space for people to take walks in the shade of the pine trees. The building itself comprises nearly 22,000 square feet, much of it devoted to the spacious classrooms where students take their life-skills courses and engage in the counseling activities that form a vital part of the program.

Narconon’s Special Honors and Recognitions

It was in this scenic setting that the people who attended the recent event celebrated the fact that the Narconon Astore center has been helping Italians with the battle against drug addiction throughout 19 years of continuous operation. In addition to the speeches and success stories, the event was highlighted by the recognition of two people in particular whose efforts have made enormous contributions to the longevity and effectiveness of the center. One of these was Enrico Comi, who studied the Narconon drug prevention curriculum and has subsequently delivered anti-drug lectures to more than 135,000 children and young adults across 5 countries. In honor of his accomplishments, Signore Comi received the Star of Social Merit Award. Another was Mauro Manzari, the senior technical supervisor at Narconon Astore. In his position at the center, he is responsible for supervising the progress of every single student who participates in the program. He has served in this role throughout the entire history of Narconon Astore, personally overseeing the program’s delivery to the students since 1994. His work has been to ensure that each of these students received the full benefits of the program. In the context of Narconon, this means that Signore Manzari’s duty has been to see to it that the people who came to the center for help were able to get off drugs and stay off for good and that they were rehabilitated for reintegration into society, a noble task to say the least. Having marked their 19th anniversary, Narconon Astore now moves into the future to help even more people.