Photographer Rafaella Persson traveled to Afghanistan to photograph women and children drug addicts

She says of her project:

Drug addiction is an often-told story in Afghanistan, though female and child victims are rarely highlighted. Many of the women that I photograph tell me that they see it as the only way to comfort themselves and their children at times when they have no food or they cannot keep warm. Their journey to rehabilitate themselves has them on the perilous border between addiction and sobriety, a story of many failures and few successes.[…]

I realized I continued to visit them not only to photograph their addiction but because they had become friends.

The photo essay and the piece written by Ms. Persson, at the link above are stunning, sad, touching and both shed light on a side of Afghan life that we rarely see. While it would be easy, tempting even, to objectify these people, the photographer presents them in brilliant moments of humanity.


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