Hundreds of people who have beaten drug and alcohol addiction marched through Sydney accompanied by family, friends and NSW Premier Mike Baird on Sunday.
Mr Baird paid tribute to the people who had beaten their addiction in a speech during the Sydney Recovery Walk outside Parliament House.
"Today is all about a great message to this community that if you have an addiction you can overcome, it can be defeated," Mr Baird said.
The premier joined the walk after being invited a year ago by a Jessica Kachan, a recovering addict. He met Ms Kachan during a visit to the Exodus Foundation - a charitable organisation run by Rev Bill Crews in inner Sydney.
"I got to tell him my story and he listened to what the Recovery Walk was all about," Ms Kachan said.
"I was trying to explain to him that we always hear about the addiction side but we never see or hear the recovery stories and they're positive."
The Sydney Recovery Walk was part of a global move to highlight the ability of people to recover from addiction and followed events held in the United States and the United Kingdom.
Ms Kachan, who was one of the organisers of the Sydney event, said more attention was needed on addiction to prescription drugs, which at one stage had reduced her to a body weight of just 30kg and left her hospitalised.
Meeting other recovering people had been central to getting herself better, she said.
"Meeting sober people and people in recovery - I think that is the key to getting well," she said.
Mr Crews said Mr Baird had shown a strong message of support by participating in the march.
"It's a real tribute to him because he didn't really know what he was getting into," he said.
Mr Crews said the march was aimed at helping addicts see a way to beat their problem.
"You hear all this panic stuff about ice is a death sentence, and this is living evidence that you can grow through it," he said.
Mr Crews said despite all the attention on ice, alcohol was a bigger problem when it came to addiction.
"If we've got an ice epidemic then we've got an alcohol pandemic," he said.
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