Pubdate: Thu, 28 Feb 2002
Source: Eau Claire Leader-Telegram (WI)
Copyright: 2002 Eau Claire Press
Contact:  http://www.leadertelegram.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/236

TREATMENT METHODS OUTDATED

A recent letter-writer said it is a misperception that alcoholics and 
addicts can get government benefits. In reality they are being denied 
access to medical benefits and are being warehoused in a "vast new 
prison-industrial complex."

Last fall, I read two books from the Gundersen Clinic library in La Crosse. 
The first was on Alcoholics Anonymous, written more than 50 years ago. It 
was deeply immersed in philosophy with quotations from St. Thomas Aquinas. 
The author believed the organization has helped "many," but it wasn't known 
how many. He wrote that doctors who had examined alcoholics reported that 
alcoholics were the most "selfish" people they had ever seen. (Keep in mind 
that this was written more than 50 years ago.)

The second book was written with today's knowledge of drugs and their 
effects on people. Each chapter was devoted to a different drug with an 
explanation of the drug and its effect.

The book covered drugs both legal and illegal, everything from alcohol to 
ecstasy. The author expressed in the introduction of the book that it is 
better to be "in the know" then to "just say no."

I have read more than once that addiction is a brain disease. Alcoholics 
are still being treated 1940s style. Why must an alcoholic be anonymous? 
Why isn't his disease treated like any other? Alcoholics certainly aren't 
anonymous when they are in the news as drunken drivers.

I would like to see the treatment of alcoholism placed in the hands of 
medical doctors who have scientific knowledge and realistic treatments. We 
need more than philosophy, spirituality and talk therapy. We need a better 
treatment for addiction.

ELIZABETH M. PAMPUCH

Independence
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MAP posted-by: Beth