Pubdate: Mon, 14 Mar 2016 Source: New York Times (NY) Copyright: 2016 The New York Times Company Contact: http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/lettertoeditor.html Website: http://www.nytimes.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/298 Author: Susan G. Gevertz Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v16/n134/a06.html WHAT TO DO ABOUT HEROIN ADDICTION To the Editor: The recent increase in heroin use in Boston and throughout the country should come as no surprise to anyone. Following an increase in the prescribing of opioid painkillers, a number of steps were taken to reduce such prescribing markedly, but with no attention whatever paid to the patients who had become dependent, not even offers of detoxification. Many, predictably, turned to the much cheaper and widely available alternative of heroin. The only tangential reference to treatment in your article is the statement that a particular stretch of Massachusetts Avenue is known as Methadone Mile. Would that it were so! Along with all other forms of treatment, methadone maintenance - the gold standard of care - should be readily available to all who want and need help for their dependence, and who with tragic frequency die without it. SUSAN G. GEVERTZ Scarsdale, N.Y. The writer is a health care consultant. - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom