Pubdate: Thu, 01 Feb 2007 Source: Boston Globe (MA) Copyright: 2007 Globe Newspaper Company Contact: http://www.boston.com/globe/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/52 Author: Jody Price Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/heroin.htm (Heroin) OFFICIALS DRAG THEIR FEET IN FIGHT AGAINST HEROIN ADDICTION I would like to thank Emily Sweeney for her insightful article on the rise of heroin deaths and use south of Boston ("Heroin deaths on the rise," Globe South, Jan. 14). I am, however, disheartened that this epidemic continues to escalate, unabated, almost a year after Ms. Sweeney wrote her article on heroin use in the area, highlighting an information forum at the Unity Church in North Easton. Our public officials and elected representatives continue to drag their feet on increased funding for, and accessibility to, aggressive rehabilitation and educational programs. Their inaction abandons families to be destroyed by the gut-wrenching fear and life-changing grief they suffer, struggling to save their children, then losing them to overdose. My own family is such a family. This is beyond indifference and inhuman. Something must be done now. We cannot wait another 11 months for our medical and social service groups to act and our politicians to confront this epidemic. The first step is to ensure that when families, as a last desperate act, use Section 35 to commit their children to state facilities for 30 days, that their children be mandated to stay the full 30 days, and not one minute less. If politicians on Beacon Hill were to support such a mandate, it would give addicts a glimmer of hope to conquer this drug. Now, the state is releasing such users as early as two weeks after commitment. This is especially true in the new women's facility in New Bedford, where women have been released after two weeks and declared "ready" to start a new life. Everyone who has dealt with heroin addiction knows that no one has a chance of recovery with only two weeks off the streets. The user not only returns to a hopeless life of addiction and probable death, but public safety remains compromised as the addict finds money in whatever way he or she can. The two-week approach to recovery is laughable, if it were not so tragic. Governor Deval Patrick offered us a glimmer of hope when he cited heroin use as one of the serious ills he sees impeding the progress of our state. Attention, education, money, and action must come now, in the names of all our children we have already lost, and the many who are standing on the edge of the abyss. Jody Price Brockton - --- MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman