Source: Waco TribuneHerald/Guest Column May 23, 1997 Contact: Change the approach in drug war (Don't worry about marijuana go after heroin) "Drugs arouse paranoia in politicians," complains Anthony Lewis in a recent column in the TribuneHerald. But why shouldn't those politicians worry? They know what happened to others who dared suggest that maybe we should restudy the question of drug control. They know opponents will be quick to label them as "soft on drugs" if they appear to waver in the least on this issue. We are running the war drugs like Hitler ran the Battle of Stalingrad. No retreat. No withdrawl. The real military experts knew this was not the way the German army won battles, but for Hitler the symbolic was more important than the sensible. And so he sacrificed the lives of thousands of German soldiers in that vain struggle. So we too go on year after year, standing firm in our struggle against the drug traffic, always certain that we will eventually win if we just pour enough money and people into the the fight and continue to lock up more and more addicts and dealers. To suggest otherwise would be to show a weakness that would guarantee our defeat in this part of the general war against depravity as Cal Thomas prefers to call it. Even when we find ourselves in a stalemate we can still wistfully hope that somehow, sometime "education" will solve the problem. Meanwhile whole sections of our cities are no longer safe places in which to raise a family. Every year more and more children take up the drug habit. Some get into the business themselves. A number lost their lives in battles with rival dealers. Loyal DEA agents are tortured and murdered by opponents, who continue to grow richer. The law enforcement and judicial systems in some Latin American countries fall into ruin as the drug trade becomes more powerful than their government. Even those of us who can afford to live outside the problem areas may still find our homes and automobiles burglarized and our theft insurance rates rising because of addicts desperate to support their drug habit. Since drug addicts are responsible for a disproportionate share of the most serious aspects of the drug problem such as theft, enticement of others to take up the habit, the spread of HIV, and drugresistant tuberculosis, would it not be sensible to look at all the ways by which their harmful activities might be reduced and concentrate on some programs which might prove more effective than those we've already tried even though it may appear that we are retreating from our traditional insistence upon unconditional surrender and total victory. Needle exchange programs have been a very small step in this direction. If we were just willing to let heroin and cocaine addicts remain addicts, at least until they themselves decided that they really wanted to kick the habit, how much less would be their activity in recruiting new users? Whether we allow them to purchase drugs for their own use legally and at a low cost (probably from a government outlet) or supply them in a controlled fashion in hospicelike settings, the cost to society would have to be less than what we are already paying for police to round up only a fraction of them and keep them in prison, not to mention the losses in lives and property. How best to do this is what we should be studying first. Marijuana issues are much less urgent. James Morse of McGregor is a physician employed at Fort Hood, retired from the faculty of the Texas A&M College of Medicine.