Prescribing Habits Have Changed, Doctors Say; State Touts Database A lot of Dr. Jeffrey Miller's patients come to him in severe pain after car accidents, traumatic falls and sports injuries. But over the 22 years the orthopedic surgeon has been practicing in New London, he's seen a marked change in attitudes within the medical community, from patients themselves and from health care regulators, toward how that pain is treated - a change that has become even more pronounced with the recent heroin crisis. [continues 1420 words]
In the headlines, "Heroin is a disease," (Feb. 17), though commendable, isn't accurate. Heroin is just one substance that, like many, can cause the disease of addiction. As one long free of his addiction to another substance, alcohol, I'm concerned because the recent publicity over heroin deaths masks the fact that alcohol is a deadlier killer. Alcohol-related deaths dwarf those caused by all illegal drugs combined. Despite my near-fatal addiction, like all serious observers I don't suggest banning John Barleycorn; Prohibition failed miserably. But so, all too obviously, has the so-called War on Drugs. In fact, the war has only made things worse. [continues 110 words]
Jerry Cunningham (Letter: Discourage demand for drugs, Jan. 24) must not be aware the discredited D.A.R.E. program is history because studies (including government studies) indicated it caused more drug use than no anti-drug program at all. One of the ways it increased hard drug addiction rates is by claiming cannabis (marijuana) was the worst "drug." It parroted prohibitionist government's laughable notion that cannabis is a Schedule I substance alongside heroin, while meth and cocaine are only Schedule II substances. How many Americans were taught heroin is no worse than cannabis and when they tried cannabis thought hard drugs must not be so bad, either, only to find themselves suddenly addicted to hard drugs? Prohibiting the relatively safe, extremely popular God-given plant and labeling it alongside heroin creates contempt for drug laws and the farce must end for hard drug addiction rates to diminish. - - Stan White Dillon, Colorado [end]
I must be getting old. I actually found myself sympathetic to the message Sean Penn was trying to deliver on CBS. Let me explain. Two days before the Sean Penn interview aired, there was a story in the local paper of yet another young man dying from a heroin overdose. If Sean Penn's point was that if we want to stop the death and destruction caused by drugs, the war on drugs must be fought on two fronts, I wholehearted agree. [continues 232 words]
I must be getting old. I actually found myself sympathetic to the message Sean Penn was trying to deliver on CBS. Let me explain. Two days before the Sean Penn interview aired, there was a story in the local paper of yet another young man dying from a heroin overdose. If Sean Penn's point was that if we want to stop the death and destruction caused by drugs, the war on drugs must be fought on two fronts, I wholehearted agree. [continues 233 words]
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. In January 1964, the Beatles first broke onto the Billboard chart with "I Want to Hold Your Hand;" by June, Ringo Starr had collapsed from tonsillitis and pharyngitis. In January, the surgeon general announced that scientists had found conclusive evidence linking smoking to cancer and thus launched our highly successful 50-year public-health fight against tobacco. In August, the North Vietnamese fired on a U.S. naval ship in the Gulf of Tonkin, which led to the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution and the public phase of the Vietnam War. Alongside an accelerating deployment of conventional troops would come their widespread use of marijuana and heroin. [continues 765 words]
A new tool in the war against drugs may turn out to be one of the most effective because it saves lives in the nick of time. It's called naloxone hydrochloride - commonly referred to by the brand name Narcan - a life-saving medication that can stop or reverse the effects of an opioid overdose. No longer is it just illegal drugs such as heroin and cocaine that are being abused, but also opioids that include prescription medications such as oxycodone, hydrocodone, and morphine. JOHN BERRY - REGISTER CITIZEN FILE PHOTO Naloxone hydrochloride, known by the name-brand Narcan, in a medical kit on a Campion Ambulance in Torrington. [continues 444 words]
A new tool in the war against drugs may turn out to be one of the most effective because it saves lives in the nick of time. It's called naloxone hydrochloride - commonly referred to by the brand name Narcan - a life-saving medication that can stop or reverse the effects of an opioid overdose. No longer is it just illegal drugs such as heroin and cocaine that are being abused, but also opioids that include prescription medications such as oxycodone, hydrocodone, and morphine. [continues 444 words]
Culture Change Seen As Authorities Target Big Hauls, Weapons NEW HAVEN - A West Haven man charged with conspiring in a marijuana trafficking scheme in New Haven will stand trial in federal court in December. Jesse Wrubel was charged by a federal grand jury in February 2014 for being involved in a marijuana trafficking scheme involving 60 pounds of marijuana and three stolen firearms. His co-defendant, Matthew Voloshin, has elected to plead guilty and awaits sentencing. The two have been detained since Feb. 7, 2014. [continues 935 words]
Concerns voiced by the first selectman, the police chief, the town social services director, and a state representative persuaded the Planning and Zoning Commission it might not be time for medical marijuana facilities in Ridgefield. "From a law-enforcement perspective, do I want to see more and more people coming in, potentially driving under the influence?" police Chief John Roche said. "No, I don't." The commission voted 6-to-2 Tuesday night, Oct. 27, to have Town Planner Betty Brosius put together a regulation prohibiting medical marijuana facilities in Ridgefield. [continues 1092 words]
Half a year ago, Colorado and Washington voters approved ballot measures to make marijuana legal in their states. But ending the pot prohibition can't happen overnight, even after electoral wins like that. Just ask Gil Kerlikowske, the nation's "drug czar." "Neither a state nor the executive branch can nullify a statute passed by Congress," Kerlikowske declared in a mid-April appearance at the National Press Club. That makes it sound pretty improbable that Colorado and Washington voters will see the change they supported at the ballot box anytime soon, doesn't it? [continues 494 words]
'Inconsistencies' Cited in Handling by Nl Police New London - Defense attorneys representing dozens of clients charged with drug crimes by New London police have been receiving letters from State's Attorney Michael L. Regan indicating that the evidence seized in their clients' cases may have been compromised. Regan said Tuesday that an audit of the police department property room by the state police Central District Major Crime Squad and New London police is continuing. To date, the audit has revealed "several inconsistencies," according to police. [continues 697 words]
This is in response to the editorial "Malloy didn't call anyone racist but drug enforcement is" (May 18). Regarding the comments made by Gov. Dannel Malloy that upset Republican legislators: The drug war has been waged in a racist manner since its inception. The Harrison Narcotics Act of 1914 was preceded by a wave of anti-immigrant sentiment. Opium was identified with Chinese laborers, marijuana with Mexicans, and cocaine with African-Americans. Racial profiling continues to be the norm, despite similar rates of drug use for minorities and whites. Support for the drug war would end overnight if whites were incarcerated for drugs at the same rate as minorities. [continues 117 words]
Republican state legislators want an apology from Governor Malloy for what they construe as his accusation that they are racist for opposing repeal of the law establishing 1,500-foot "drug-free" zones around schools, whereby mere possession of drugs is made a felony nearly everywhere in cities, where most blacks and Hispanics live, but not so much in suburbs and rural towns, where most whites live. While the governor, a Democrat, was not obliged to apologize for what he didn't quite say, he might have remembered that soft words turn away wrath and expressed regret for misunderstanding. That would have facilitated repeal of the questionable drug law instead of engendering resentment of repeal. [continues 537 words]
Yale Professor: Safety, THC Content, Expanding Use at Issue MIDDLETOWN - Since the federal government historically has obstructed scientific research of marijuana, there's an absence of highquality evidence, just as many states, including Connecticut, already have rolled out the red carpet to the fast-growing medical marijuana industry. It's a Catch 22, according to Dr. Deepak C. D'Souza, a Yale professor-psychiatrist and member of the Medical Marijuana Board of Physicians. "In the absence of gold-standard evidence, what is the bar for legalization?" D'Souza asked Tuesday at the Middlesex County Substance Abuse Action Council's spring forum. [continues 530 words]
Connecticut Republican state legislators are angry again at Gov. Dannel Malloy. Last week the governor noted the racially disproportionate effect of the state's drug laws, which impose more severe penalties in the cities where most members of racial minorities live than in the suburbs and rural towns where most white people live. The law, the governor said, "is patently unfair and, if not racist in intent, is racist in its outcome." The governor has proposed to repeal the law that makes mere drug possession in cities a more serious crime than drug possession elsewhere. He does not propose to change the law about selling drugs. [continues 393 words]
Several years ago at a public forum, I found myself sitting in front of Mayor John Daniels. I took the opportunity to ask him what he thought was the greatest legacy of his administration. He responded that community policing would have been his greatest legacy but that the city had all but abandoned it. Fortunately this approach to law enforcement has since been restored. Mayor Daniels said that the city's needle-exchange program had been his greatest single gift to the city. This program, which he had first opposed and ultimately embraced, was shown by a landmark Yale Public Health study to have reduced new AIDS infections in New Haven (80 percent of which were transmitted by hypodermic needles) by a third. The level of trust created by not being subject to arrest by participating also provided an opportunity for health professionals to refer addicts to drug rehabilitation programs that they might otherwise not have known about or been open to considering. [continues 97 words]
Give thanks for the little things, they say. A bill that would stop the feds from going after medical marijuana users in states that permit such activity is something for which we should give thanks. But it is little. Let's not criticize the sponsoring senators - Rand Paul, R-Ky., Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., and Cory Booker, D-N.J. - for such a small reprieve from the war on drugs. They've probably gone about as far as they could within the two-faced confines of our national politics. [continues 537 words]
Another reason to re-legalize cannabis (marijuana) for sick citizens and their families that doesn't get mentioned (Letter: Medical marijuana can improve quality of life for hundreds of children, March 2, 2015) is because it is biblically correct since God (The Ecologician) created all the seed bearing plants saying they're all good on literally the very first page of the Bible. Further, many people know of cannabis as the tree of life and the very last page of the Bible indicates the leaves of the tree of life are for the healing of the nations. Christ Jesus risked jail in order to heal the sick. A sane or moral argument to cage sick people who use cannabis doesn't exist. Stan White Dillon, Colorado [end]
John S. Santa has been successful in the fuel oil and energy business, but his real passion is trying to reduce the population of nonviolent offenders in the state's correctional system and to help those who are released into a society that turns its back on ex-offenders. Santa and the Rev. Marilyn B. Kendrix, associate pastor of Church of the Redeemer, United Church of Christ, met with the New Haven Register's editorial board Tuesday as members of the Malta Justice Initiative, which is, among other things, supporting Gov. Dannel P. Malloy's "Second Chance Society" proposals to reduce the human and financial costs of the state's criminal justice system. [continues 808 words]
Inside Connecticut
