Pubdate: Fri, 06 May 2005
Source: Standard-Times (MA)
Copyright: 2005 The Standard-Times
Contact:  http://www.s-t.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/422
Author: Robert Waxler

WESTPORT STORY SHOWS FAILURE OF NERVE

We should all be saddened by what happened the other day in
Westport.

Stanley Street Treatment and Reources (SSTAR) is the largest provider
of drug and alcohol detoxification and treatment services in this
area. They had a good idea, one that could save lives. But they were
run out of town by a failure of nerve and an unruly mob. Typical, I
suppose, of the way we continue to react to a growing plague, one that
could strike any of us -- drug addiction.

No one wakes up one day and says they want to be a drug addict. If you
think they do, then you don't know what addiction is all about. It
could happen to anyone -- you or me. In fact, I am willing to bet
there are already addicts in your neighborhood, if not in your family.

But that's not the point, you say. Why should we have a needle
exchange program only in Westport, in our neighborhood? Well, I agree.
We should have a program in New Bedford and Fall River too.

Did you know that these cities rank number one and two among cities
whose HIV population became infected through sharing needles and
syringes between 2001 and 2003, according to the Massachsuetts
Department of Public Health HIV/AIDS Data Fact Sheet published in
March 2005? But doesn't making needle possession illegal reduce drug
consumption, you might ask. Absolutely not.

Get the facts. No research has ever indicated that. These programs do
reduce the spread of HIV though, and many individuals have been known
to reduce their use and seek treatment. These programs save lives.
Something any good citizen should favor, I would think.

Does it matter that the National Commission on AIDS, the General
Accounting Office, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the
National Academy of Sciences, the Office of Technology Assessment, and
the Department of Health and Human Service have all shown that syringe
exchange programs are helpful. And that the Massachusetts Department
of Health, the Massachsuetts HIV Prevention and Planning Group, the
American Medical Association, the American Health Association, the
American Pharmaceutical Association, the National Academy of Science,
the American Bar Association and the U.S. Conference of Mayors all
endorse syringe exchange? I guess it doesn't matter.

What seems clear to me though from the long history of chemical abuse
is that prohibition helps create a nation of law-breakers and puts a
lot of people who need help in harm's way. Does anyone remember the
disastrous results of the Volstead Act of 1919, when we wanted to
prohibit alcohol? We made so many upstanding citizens into criminals,
not to mention the illegal economy that we helped to create, that by
the end of 1933 Congress finally came to its senses and repealed the
act. Perhaps we should think about some of our current laws in a
similar context.

We will never win the war on drugs by treating it as a crime. Since
President Richard Nixon began that war in 1969, it has helped fuel an
underground economy world-wide worth more than $500 billion per year
and has increasingly targeted not only dealers but the sad user on the
street battling an addiction.

That user is our neighbor today.

We need to get rid of all the stereotypes about drug addiction. Then
perhaps we can begin an intelligent conversation about how to deal
with this insidious problem. Even if we don't want to recognize the
humanity of the addict, we need to look at the facts.

For example, a Columbia University survey in 1998 discovered that 21
percent of violent criminals in state prisons committed their felonies
while under the influence of alcohol alone; only 1 percent were on
heroin alone. That is something to consider. Should we reinstate the
prohibition on alcohol? We need to approach drug addiction with a
medical model, not a trumped-up criminal model. I congratulate STARR
for their work treating the addict and trying to establish harm
reduction programs.

We need pragmatic and humane solutions to these difficult problems.
And that probably means we need more courage, less failure of nerve,
more insight, and less yelling and screaming in a futile attempt to
protect ourselves from the demons created through stereotypes.
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Robert Waxler is a professor of English at UMass Dartmouth. He and his
wife, Linda, co-authored "Losing Jonathan," a book about the 1995
death of their son, at 26, after a battle with heroin.
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