THIS HAS BEEN the year of American democracy. The values of this nation have never been more dramatically on display before the world. "Freedom" has been the watch word, from Operation Iraqi Freedom to the coming Freedom Tower at Ground Zero in New York. In a period of enormous stress, America has pulled itself together, freshly defined its beliefs, and begun to press them on others. Washington aims at nothing less than the propagation of US notions of civil order and social justice everywhere. And why shouldn't citizens be proud? But this vision throws a shadow. Contradictions of American idealism have also been manifest with rare clarity this year -- and not only in wars abroad. A signal event took place in Massachusetts as the year approached its end. A jury made up of citizens of one of the relatively few states that outlaws the death penalty nevertheless imposed it in the federal murder case against Gary Lee Sampson, the brutal killer of Jonathan Rizzo and Philip McCloskey. As advocates of the death penalty hoped, this decision in the heart of a community that has long rejected capital punishment -- the last execution in Massachusetts was in 1947 -- speeds America's complete return to frontier justice. [continues 616 words]
It's not easy having a famous dad. After Harvard student Albert Gore III -- yes, son of that Albert Gore -- made the news last week for being arrested in Maryland for marijuana possession, activists made him a poster boy for their campaign against a 1998 law that denies financial aid to any student with a drug conviction. The law has deprived more than 124,000 students of financial aid, according to Students for Sensible Drug Policy, which bills itself as the fastest-growing student organization in the United States. No other crime triggers the same punishment. "If Al Gore's son was paying for school with financial aid, a conviction for marijuana possession could end his education and seriously damage his future," said SSDP national director Darrell Rogers in a statement. "Since his parents can afford to pay for his education, Albert Gore III's Harvard education will continue uninterrupted." Gore, 21, and two passengers were arrested Dec. 19 when he was stopped for driving without his lights on. An officer, who noticed the windows and sunroof open in cold weather, found a marijuana cigarette and a cigarette box containing suspected marijuana. [end]
MARLBOROUGH -- The heroin found on city streets flows in from Framingham while the large quantity of Ecstasy is brought here from Worcester. That is what detectives have concluded after spending almost a year working undercover. The end of a 10-month drug operation that resulted in 23 arrests Wednesday has given Marlborough Police a behind-the-scenes look at what drugs flow into the city and from where. Crack and powder cocaine, as well as heroin, marijuana and Ecstasy, were the most evident drugs bought and sold within the city and nearby communities during Marlborough's investigation, Lt. Arthur Brodeur said. Ecstasy was supplied from Worcester while the heroin came in from Framingham, Brodeur said. [continues 640 words]
Evidence Is Suppressed WORCESTER- A judge has ordered the suppression of evidence in a drug case in which he accused certain members of the Worcester Police Department vice squad of acting unlawfully and using "subterfuges" and "shortcuts that undermine the constitutional rights of all of us." In a 25-page decision allowing a defense motion to suppress evidence, Superior Court Judge Peter W. Agnes Jr. wrote, "The tactics used by the police in this case should be of concern to a wider audience than those involved directly in this case." [continues 1587 words]
Employers nowadays want a strand of your hair rather than a cup of your urine. The Boston Police Department changed to hair testing a year ago. So did Illinois-based Kraft Foods. "We felt the hair test was a much better testing methodology," said Kraft Foods spokeswoman Kathy Kanuth. Even the federal government, which still relies heavily on urine tests, is considering changing its regulations and procedures to include hair and other testing methods. Final regulations are expected in about 18 months. One reason for the switch is that employers are facing a new industry with an odd mandate: help workers beat urine tests. [continues 1214 words]
As an undercover narcotics officer, Caroline Guarino-Wilichoski of the Topsfield Police Department saw, "the other side of what drugs can do." "I witnessed first-hand how drugs can destroy lives," she said. Her experiences in the field, which included buying crack cocaine from unsuspecting drug dealers throughout the North Shore, left her even more committed to keeping all children - her own as well as others - safe and away from drugs. Last Thursday, at Topsfield's Chamber of Commerce holiday gathering, Wilichoski was officially recognized as the town's new police officer assigned to teach the Drug Abuse Resistance Education curriculum to the town's sixth graders. Otherwise known as DARE, the program can be applied all across the board, from kindergarten through eighth grade, but most communities opt to focus on students transitioning from the final year of elementary school into middle or junior high school, according to Wilichoski. [continues 487 words]
Marijuana Surpasses Cigs In Hub Boston teenagers are more likely to light up a joint than a Marlboro, a report released yesterday by the City of Boston found. Just 15 percent of Boston high school students told school officials they smoked cigarettes, but 22 percent of the students said they used marijuana, according The Boston 2003 Trend Report: Snapshot of Boston's Children and Youth. Pot smoking has held steady since 1993, the first year included in the study. But cigarette smoking shows a steady decline: from 21 percent of teens in 1993 to 15 percent in 2001, the most recent year surveyed. [continues 226 words]
Recently, the Boston Phoenix sent three writers to cover the New England governors' drug summit at Faneuil Hall, organized by the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP). Their stories were collectively headlined, Drugs: Why Can't Politicians Face Facts? I have participated in numerous such events. From 1979 to 1989, I was counsel to the US House of Representatives Committee on the Judiciary. In 1988, I helped write the legislation creating the ONDCP. I have set up or attended at least 100 congressional anti-drug hearings or events over the years. Unfortunately, your front-page headline offers a generally well-founded lament. And the causes of our politicians' disconnect from the reality of drug use and the consequences of drug policy must be identified if we are to get beyond the policy failures in which we are mired. [continues 316 words]
ATTLEBORO -- Area law enforcement officials fear rising heroin use in the state, but say the highly addictive drug has so far not flooded area streets as it has in larger cities. " I think coke is the primary drug of choice. But heroin has gained a lot of ground in the last few years, partially because it's cheap," Attleboro Detective Kenneth Collins said. " Is heroin the drug of choice? Not for us," North Attleboro Detective Sgt. David Dawes said. Mostly it's marijuana and cocaine. Maybe it's hitting the cities first." [continues 713 words]
Anti-HIV plan is common elsewhere Mayor Thomas M. Menino is championing a campaign on Beacon Hill to permit over-the-counter sales of syringes, a measure other states have adopted in the hope that drug addicts will stop using dirty needles, a leading cause of HIV infection. More than one-fifth of HIV infections in the state in recent years have been linked directly to injected drugs, the second-most common source of the virus. Boston is one of just four cities and towns in the Commonwealth -- the others are Cambridge, Northampton, and Provincetown -- that run needle-exchange programs so that junkies can turn in their tainted syringes for clean ones. [continues 690 words]
CHELMSFORD -- The police officer who headed the town's DARE program is under investigation for the alleged theft of as much as $20,000 in Police Department funds, sources said yesterday. Police Chief Raymond McCusker confirmed that police have launched an investigation into Officer Mike Horan, who has been placed on paid administrative leave. But McCusker declined to comment on the nature of the inquiry. "I don't discuss personnel issues," McCusker said. "When and if we can discuss it, we will." [continues 173 words]
Report Hits State Cuts In Higher Ed For the first time in at least 35 years, Massachusetts is spending more on prisons and jails than on public higher education, according to a report released yesterday. This year's state budget included $816 million in appropriations for campuses and student financial aid, and $830 million for prisons and jails, said the report from the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation. "It says something very striking about the way that priorities have crept up on us," said Cameron Huff, senior research associate at the business-backed fiscal watchdog group. "You don't see the same cuts in corrections because there's nobody to shift the cost onto. In higher education, it's been students and parents who've been the shock absorbers." [continues 392 words]
Hanover Alliance Plans Outreach to Teens, Parents Getting more parents and students involved in the war against substance abuse by teens are just some of the goals being set by the Hanover Alliance for the Prevention of Substance Abuse (HAPSA). Alliance officials say drug and alcohol use by local youths appears to be somewhat lower than by teens from nearby communities, but vigilance against it must continue. These observations are just some of the objectives HAPSA is noting as it marks its 20th anniversary. [continues 714 words]
He was in his early 30s, a heroin user for years. Then one day this fall, members of his family found him lying in bed, dead from an overdose. "He used it one time too many," Quincy police Sgt. Pat Glynn said. The man was the sixth killed by the drug in Quincy in four months and the 13th this year - all of them casualties of cheaper, purer heroin that law enforcement officials say is more plentiful than ever on the South Shore. [continues 958 words]
The makers of OxyContin, the controversial pain medication that has been linked to widespread abuse, yesterday gave Boston a $125,000 grant to educate teenagers on the hazards of prescription drugs, part of an ongoing national campaign that some health organizations have tried to bar from their communities. Along with the money, drug company Purdue Pharma L.P. is distributing a health curriculum called "Painfully Obvious" that warns young people about the dangers of misusing medications. With the grant, Boston's Public Health Commission will hire two educators and one trainer, said Barbara Ferrer, deputy health director. The focus will be on reaching out to teenagers who are trying risky behaviors such as drug abuse. Ferrer said the commission has also received larger grants from drug companies Merck Inc. and GlaxoSmithKline. [continues 341 words]
When The Feat Of Addiction Outweighs The Pain America is seriously ambivalent about controlling chronic pain, which afflicts more than 50 million people and costs $100 billion a year. On the one hand, we grossly undertreat it: Management of chronic pain and the pain of dying patients is arguably the most egregiously neglected field of medicine. On the other, as a society, we are obsessed with the war on drugs, and the fear of addiction to narcotics. Pain patients who were functioning well on morphine-like drugs such as oxycodone (OxyContin) are now fearful of them - or just plain can't get them because doctors won't prescribe the drugs and pharmacies won't stock them. [continues 845 words]
Cheap Price Fuels Alarming Increase In Overdoses Locally (NORTHAMPTON) Within days of each other in August, two local men were found dead of what police suspect were heroin overdoses. Two weeks ago, police shut down a Main Street apartment that had been the scene of a months-long investigation identifying it as a place known to both buy and use drugs, including heroin. Northampton Police Detective Lt. Kenneth Patenaude said the Oct. 10 arrests of the six people at 184 Main St. shut down what had become "a flophouse for people to come and use cocaine and heroin." [continues 1220 words]
Both U.S. senators from Massachusetts, Edward M. Kennedy and John Kerry, have written a letter to the federal Drug Enforcement Administration urging approval of an application by the University of Massachusetts to grow high-quality marijuana for medicinal research. Backers of the proposal by plant and soil sciences professor Lyle Craker say support from Kennedy and Kerry, along with the recent refusal by the Supreme Court to consider penalizing doctors for recommending medicinal marijuana, put UMass in a much better position to win DEA approval than previously. [continues 525 words]
People trying to overcome their heroin addictions will have a harder time finding help in the Pioneer Valley, now that state budget cuts have forced the closure of one of this area's four detox centers. Beacon Recovery Center, of Franklin Medical Center in Greenfield, which opened in 1980 and had 14 beds, closed May 9. It was the only detox facility along the Route 2 corridor, said Dr. Amy Fowler, head of Cooley Dickinson Hospital's outpatient substance abuse center. [continues 413 words]
Rush Limbaugh has gone into rehab, promising that he'll be free of his addiction to painkillers and back on the radio in 30 days. We wish him success, but addiction specialists warn that OxyContin, one of the drugs Limbaugh is accused of abusing, is tougher to kick than heroin. Off the air, Limbaugh must be aware of how hard it is to beat a drug habit. After all, this is reportedly his third trip to rehab. Limbaugh's stay in some pricey rehab center may be interrupted, however, by that scourge of drug users, the police. Buying bulk quantities of illegal prescription drugs with cigar boxes stuffed with cash can land him some serious time, if prosecutors decide to indict. [continues 204 words]
The annual survey of parents, and children ages 12 to 17, by Columbia University's National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse found that children who are frequently bored are 50 percent more likely to get drunk, use illegal drugs or smoke. In addition, teens who experience high levels of stress are twice as likely to smoke, drink or use drugs as children with little anxiety in their lives. The study further found that teens who have $25 or more a week in spending money are twice as likely to smoke, drink or use drugs. The report, according to Joseph Califano Jr., chairman and president of the center, also showed that 55 percent of all children have a moderate or high risk of drug misuse. [continues 179 words]
Is New Bedford the "heroin capital" of New England, as Fox News talk show host Bill O'Reilly dubbed it while interviewing Emilio Cruz? The city is probably not the capital just because it is so much smaller than places such as Hartford, New Haven, Bridgeport and Boston. But there is no doubt that New Bedford has a major heroin problem and is considered by federal officials to be a major hub for distribution of the drug. And there is no doubt that the city has been slow to face up to its drug problem. Denial is deeply woven into the political fabric of the city. [continues 349 words]
SOUTHBRIDGE- In what he says is a sad indicator of the rise in heroin use here, Police Chief Daniel R. Charette found baby formula has become a popular target for heroin users to shoplift. "It's expensive, and they can sell it quickly to pay for a fix," he said. "Some stores have to keep it behind counters." But sadder still are the calls police are getting from residents - some of them personal acquaintances - asking for help with heroin-addicted relatives, he said. [continues 954 words]
School Committee member Emilio E. Cruz appeared on Fox News' "The O'Reilly Factor" last night, a national cable television talk show, arguing against a proposal to test school children for drug use. Mr. Cruz told host Bill O'Reilly that he felt the proposal to test students for drugs -- with parental consent -- was a vote-getting ploy by Mayor Frederick M. Kalisz Jr. right before an election. Mr. Cruz also said he is worried about the confidentiality of the tests. [continues 215 words]
Local police say their intensified efforts to get heroin and cocaine dealers off city streets this year are increasingly matched by defense lawyers fighting to get the drug cases dismissed in district court. "Defense counsel have become much more aggressive in what they do," said Fitchburg police Capt. Charles Tasca. "In the end, it causes both sides to operate at a higher level. I believe it benefits everyone." Gov. Mitt Romney's recent announcement that the state's heroin epidemic has "snuck up on us" came with little fanfare to officials in Fitchburg and Leominster, where the heroin problem has long proved a visible sore spot. [continues 1178 words]
The country's drug czar said in Boston last week that random drug testing in schools would be a good tool for use in confronting a new drug epidemic. John Walters, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, is way off base with this proposal. The schools have more than they can handle as it is. With increased testing requirements from both the federal and state governments, and tight budgets to live with, schools are in no position to handle another mission. [continues 227 words]
Since the Supreme Court ruled without comment, court observers can only guess at the reasoning behind the justices' surprising decision last week permitting the medical use of marijuana. The court must have been impressed, however, by the arguments of both liberal and conservative judges on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, whose ruling a year ago the high court has now upheld. The appeals judges in San Francisco endorsed "principles of federalism" that the current Supreme Court generally respects, and they declared that the federal government butting into doctor-patient communications violates constitutional rights of free speech. [continues 398 words]
You're Rush Limbaugh and you wonder how it went so wrong so quickly. Just two weeks ago, your "dittoheads" were lined up at the altar of your ignorant utterances, yelling amen to every skewered fact you uttered. And on weekends, you got paid a boatload of bucks to show the rest of the world that you knew even less about football than you did about public policy. Life was good, you thought. No, life was great! Now you look around and you can't believe what you see. First, you win the "Trent Lott Foot-in-Mouth Award" for saying that a pro-bowl quarterback, who happens to be African-American, was overrated because of the bias of the "liberal" sports media. Yeah, like John Dennis, Jerry Callahan, and Fred Smerlas. [continues 621 words]
Rush Limbaugh has gone into rehab, promising that he'll be free of his addiction to painkillers and back on the radio in 30 days. We wish him success, but addiction specialists warn that OxyContin, one of the drugs Limbaugh is accused of abusing, is tougher to kick than heroin. Off the air, Limbaugh must be aware of how hard it is to beat a drug habit. After all, this is reportedly his third trip to rehab. Limbaugh's stay in some pricey rehab center may be interrupted, however, by that scourge of drug users, the police. Buying bulk quantities of illegal prescription drugs with cigar boxes stuffed with cash can land him some serious time, if prosecutors decide to indict. [continues 203 words]
NEW BEDFORD -- A voluntary school drug-testing program proposed by the mayor and school superintendent would make this crime-plagued city the first in the Commonwealth to experiment with an approach heavily pushed by the White House drug enforcement leader. Civil liberties advocates criticized the plan, which would affect middle and high school students registered for random drug tests by their parents, but said its voluntary structure might protect it from a legal challenge. Mayor Frederick M. Kalisz Jr. said the "aggressive and innovative" voluntary testing concept proposed last week will pass constitutional muster and open a wider debate over the best way to intervene early and prevent teenage drug use."We're not out to violate anyone's civil rights. We're out to protect future generations," Kalisz said. Only parents would see the anonymous test results, he said, and students would face no sanctions under the program. [continues 998 words]
Recreational Use Of Prescription Drugs Is Widespread And Dangerous Rush Limbaugh's recent admission of an addiction to prescription drugs is only one of many examples in which celebrities have abused drugs that were initially meant to help them. This epidemic is not unique to the famous, however: it has existed at Tufts, as well as many other college campuses, for quite some time. Ritalin and Adderall are two of the most commonly abused prescription drugs on campus. Initially developed to treat attention deficit disorder, these "study drugs" have become an inexpensive way for students without attention problems to focus before a big test, or to get a high close to that of cocaine at a fraction of the price. By "bumping," or snorting, these pills, users can often reach a modest level of euphoria without the fear attached to more illicit drugs. [continues 967 words]
We talk about educating our children on drugs but we teach them that marijuana is equal to heroin ("Drug czar: Test kids," Oct. 9). Then, when they try heroin, thinking it is the same as marijuana, they develop heroin problems and we wonder why. We've been teaching this drug nonsense to our youth for 30 years and heroin use has exploded. How can we expect the youth to believe us when we teach this? If we want to solve the heroin problem, we must start with the truth on marijuana. Kim Hannah [end]
Parents Turn Out For Lockdown Day Winthrop High School opened Friday with a schoolwide lockdown, in which students were not allowed to leave classrooms while police dogs searched for drugs. At the end of the day, students were met at the exits by parents and town officials, who told them they would work to rid the school and the community of drug and alcohol problems. The students were given fliers with a simple message: "We are here today to stand up for you and your right to a drug-free, alcohol-free school."No illegal substances were found during random searches Friday, police said. [continues 734 words]
The Bush administration's efforts to ban the medical use of marijuana may have just gone up in smoke. The Supreme Court last week let stand a ruling that bars the federal government from punishing doctors who recommend it to their patients. This should clear the path for Congress to reclassify marijuana, allowing for its use when prescribed by a doctor. Doctors should decide whether pot is good or bad for a patient, not the Bush administration's lead man in the war against drugs, who wouldn't know an ulcer from heartburn. [continues 287 words]
Why Does The Bush Administration Seem So Intent On Denying Medical Marijuana To Adults In Extreme Discomfort? THE WHITE HOUSE Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) -- whose anti-pot road show blew through Boston last week -- wants you to believe that everything about marijuana is bad, bad, bad. That the plant's promising medicinal benefits are simply a "Trojan-horse issue," perpetrated by drug-reform advocates who are taking advantage of sick and dying people to advance a decriminalization agenda. [continues 1534 words]
What Really Went On At The Office Of National Drug Control Policy's Summit Of New England Governors The wisest words spoken at the Summit of New England Governors anti-drug meeting, held at Faneuil Hall last week, came from a famously incoherent local leader: the honorable mayor of Boston, Thomas M. Menino. "There's a big difference between talking about drug abuse in a conference room and talking about it on the streets with real people with real problems," noted the keeper of Boston's keys during an introductory speech before five New England governors and President Bush's drug czar, John Walters, at a half-day affair sponsored by the Office of the National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP). Perhaps the rhetoric should've ended there, less than 15 minutes into the proceedings, when everyone could still admit relative ignorance of the subject, shake hands, and make 12 o'clock tee times. Before an absurdly horrified Governor Mitt Romney would yelp about the "maawwnnsters" who loiter around local playgrounds handing out smiley-faced bags of high-potency heroin. Before Walters could slyly slip in what amounted to a hurrah for high-school drug testing seconds before a toilet break, a crafty tactic to avoid subsequent questioning on the issue. Before panel presentations about medical marijuana would devolve into reactionary ruminations about parenting better suited for a school-committee meeting. [continues 2021 words]
Why Does The Bush Administration Seem So Intent On Denying Medical Marijuana To Adults In Extreme Discomfort? THE WHITE HOUSE Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) -- whose anti-pot road show blew through Boston last week -- wants you to believe that everything about marijuana is bad, bad, bad. That the plant's promising medicinal benefits are simply a "Trojan-horse issue," perpetrated by drug-reform advocates who are taking advantage of sick and dying people to advance a decriminalization agenda. That legalizing medical marijuana would confuse the "just say no" message for adolescents and cause them to glamorize debilitating diseases like cancer, AIDS, and multiple sclerosis. [continues 1511 words]
The War On Drugs Destroys Lives But Does Nothing To Mitigate The Abuse Of Drugs In This Country OUR OBSESSION WITH drugs and our national failure to distinguish among them - equating the effects of pot, for instance, with those of heroin - have corrupted our criminal-justice system. Consider the following: as of 2000, United States prisons held 458,131 people incarcerated for drug offenses alone. That's 100,000 more inmates than the 356,626 people incarcerated throughout the European Union for all offenses combined. [continues 813 words]
Our Top Officials Warn of Predators Seeking to Addict Our Children To Drugs, but It's the Adult Users We Should Be Worrying About FOR THE RECORD, roughly one of every 65 Boston teens has used heroin, whereas about one in four lives in poverty; one in four has been driven by a drunk driver in the past month; one in six carries a gun or knife; one in seven has starved him-or herself to lose weight, and one in nine has attempted suicide in the past year. (These figures come from the National Centers for Disease Control -- see http://apps.nccd.cdc.gov/YRBSS/index.asp -- with the exception of the poverty-rate figures, which are provided by the Boston Public Health Commission.) But the mayor and the governor want to talk about how heroin is destroying our kids, so let's talk about that. [continues 2519 words]
Why Marijuana Users Are Unlikely to Lead the Next, Uh, Political Revolution Just how I wound up at the Hemp Festival last month is not something I want to get into, at least not without my attorney present. But I do want to make a few observations about the general state of the marijuana-smoking community, of which I am a proud (and, if I may add, medically necessitated) member. But before I get into all that, I'd like to share a few warm memories of my afternoon. [continues 956 words]
$31,370 Was Taken From Holden Safe Missing $31k Is Still Sought WORCESTER- A state police investigation into the disappearance of more than $30,000 from a safe at Troop C headquarters in Holden in January 2002 remains open. The $31,370 discovered missing on Jan. 9, 2002, from a combination safe in the office of Maj. Stephen Leary, then area state police commander, has not been recovered and no arrests have been made in connection with the disappearance, Lt. Marian J. McGovern said yesterday. [continues 179 words]
Principals Back Action As Rate Of Expulsions Continues To Increase PLYMOUTH - Drug-sniffing dogs will soon be roaming the parking lots and halls of the town's two high schools in an effort to reduce drug use at both schools. School committee members last night gave Principals Robert O'Day and John Siever permission to use the dogs on a sporadic basis. The first drug sweep will be announced ahead of time through notices sent home with students, Siever said. Later sweeps will be unannounced, he said. [continues 297 words]
BILLERICA -- Arguing that the punishment doesn't fit the crime, fired Billerica police Officer Dean Royston said administrators had their minds made up long before a hearing last week. Royston, 45, was fired after it was determined he bought and used marijuana, provided false information during an investigation and violated numerous departmental regulations. "It was more like a lynching than a hearing," said Royston, who is black and the department's only minority officer. "Now I know how my ancestors felt." [continues 768 words]
Boston's heroin epidemic will not be solved by random drug testing in the public schools. The proposal, touted at a meeting this week of New England governors, would divert money and energy that is far better directed at education, massive drug treatment, and targeted police enforcement. Despite the new rage for the idea in Washington, the White House drug czar, John Walters, got it wrong when he said drug testing could be "the silver bullet" in addressing heroin abuse. The Bush administration is hosting a summit on Oct. 30 to promote student drug testing, and the Supreme Court ruled last year that testing athletes and members of extracurricular clubs does not violate students' constitutional rights. But research on the efficacy of drug testing in schools is extremely thin. [continues 325 words]
The mayor of New Bedford has announced a first-of-its-kind plan to offer parents the option of having their middle and high school kids randomly drug tested. "This is not intended to be a punishment, but rather to be an assist in what are difficult times in family management (while we are also) looking to increase productivity in the classroom," said Mayor Frederick M. Kalisz Jr. Kalisz's suggestion came on the heels of this week's proposal from White House drug czar John Walters to implement random school drug testing in light of the heroin epidemic plaguing New England. [continues 188 words]
The Bush administration's support for a crackdown on heroin production in Afghanistan may spark a rise in AIDS throughout central Asia, a drug policy expert told an Institute of Politics forum last night. Sanho Tree, of the Institute for Policy Studies-a Washington-based think-tank-warned that many addicts in countries surrounding Afghanistan have become dependent on pure heroin, the only type which can be smoked. But if U.S. anti-drug policies reduce the amount of pure heroin available, addicts will be forced to use impure heroin, which requires injection, Tree said. [continues 383 words]
It's such a facile solution - drug testing. That's not to deny that drugs - hard drugs like heroin - are becoming a problem at earlier and earlier ages. But for White House drug czar John Walters to call random school drug testing ''a silver bullet'' and ''a tool that will make a difference'' is simply mindless. First, of course, there is the cost. An addiction expert interviewed by the Herald said that a routine urine test for drugs costs about $200. Saliva testing (which really only works if a person has drugs in his system at that moment) costs even more. So let's see now, where do we want to put our scarce resources? Into counseling, treatment and rehab for kids who really need it or into random testing of kids who may not have ingested anything more harmful than a Snickers bar? [continues 148 words]
NEW BEDFORD -- President Bush's drug czar told New England governors yesterday that more children in the region are dependent on illegal drugs than in any other area in the nation. John Walters, director of the Office of Drug Control Policy, speaking at the Faneuil Hall summit, singled out New England's high rate of heroin use. "It is a big business," Karen Tandy, head of the Drug Enforcement Administration, told the governors and the assembled audience. "You might as well be sitting at the border of Colombia in this Northeast region." [continues 490 words]
Gov. Mitt Romney and five other New England governors met with White House officials Wednesday morning at Faneuil Hall to discuss drug problems in New England, as protesters outside called for drug reform, including the legalization of medicinal marijuana. John Walters, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, met with the governors and other officials for the "Anti-Drug Summit of the New England states," to discuss the heroin problem in New England and the legalization of medicinal marijuana. The summit also discussed President George W. Bush's "Access to Recovery Treatment Initiative," a new three-year, $600 million federal treatment program, legislation on which Congress has not yet decided. [continues 397 words]
WORCESTER- A drug invented by a local researcher and based on a compound in marijuana relieved pain in patients without generating a "high," according to a study published last week. The results should silence concerns that ajulemic acid, the key drug ingredient, might not be a safe, effective treatment, said Sumner H. Burstein, a professor in the University of Massachusetts Medical School department of biochemistry and molecular pharmacology. "We've put to rest a lot of the doubters, people that question the psychoactivity problem," said Mr. Burstein. [continues 360 words]
Inside Massachusetts
