This article examines the policies currently applied in Saudi Arabia for treating people addicted to hard drugs. It places those policies in an international context by contrasting them with two countries with different approaches - The Netherlands and Australia. This review does not seek to identify which country has the ‘best' treatments. Rather it examines the Saudi experience within a global context. The Netherlands is widely considered to be tolerant of drug use, and it has been innovative in its approaches to this issue.  Australia is examined because it has adopted a ‘middle' approach; it is neither as tolerant as The Netherlands nor as punitive as Saudi Arabia.