Pubdate: Mon, 17 Feb 2014
Source: Herald, The (Everett, WA)
Copyright: 2014 The Daily Herald Co.
Contact:  http://www.heraldnet.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/190
Author: Don Curtis
Page: A11

PROOF THAT WAR ON DRUGS FAILED

Unbelievably, heroin use is on the rise and Snohomish County is one of
the areas that have shown a sharp increase in usage. Not as bad as
some cities, where the drug use has reached epidemic proportions, but
any increase is tragic.

It's hard to imagine how, in this day and age, considering all of the
money spent on trying to educate us, how anyone could become addicted.
To heroin especially, but to meth, prescription pain killers, etc.
etc.

These drugs are killers. Presently, 100 folks a day die from
overdosing and in some cities the number doubles annually. There is no
cure, except death, from heroin addiction. It's either addiction or
continual rehab. Marijuana use is nothing compared to this stuff and
heroin, in some parts of the country, is as cheap as a 6 pack of beer
and cheaper than prescription drugs.

We have lost the "war on drugs". We should help those that need help
and those that want to help themselves, but at some point we humans
have to start taking care of ourselves, take responsibility and suffer
the consequences for our own actions.

A typical example is the Quincy Valley Medical Center, the nearest
hospital to the Gorge Amphitheater. They have to add staff on concert
weekends to handle drug overdose cases. Concertgoers can afford the
expensive tickets and buy more than enough drugs of their choice but
they can't afford the hospital care to treat their overdose. So the
local property tax supported hospital has to absorb the cost.

A half a million bucks last year and rising. Millions of dollars,
probably billions by now, first for preventative education, then to
treat, feed, and house addicts and sometimes their families as well,
then to pursue, prosecute and jail offenders. Recently, we read that
drug "camps" in outlying areas are set up, often near food banks for
obvious reasons and food stamps have long been used as currency to buy
drugs. Were helping a few and enabling many more.

Rehabilitation does work for some, as I said, but with drug use
increasing, even in the face of all the evidence showing us how
harmful it is, isn't their a line that should be drawn? If you
repeatedly choose to ruin your life, so be it. Like drunk drivers, it
seems as if someone has to die before the lawbreaker has to pay a
severe enough penalty.

We have been told, for years now, that we don't have the money to
build more prisons. Considering the amount of money already spent, and
continue to spend, on this so called "war", building prisons to
separate the offender from society is probably a bargain.

Don Curtis

Clinton
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MAP posted-by: Matt