AHS Views

Although experimenting with drugs is getting more common among young teenagers, you don’t really expect them to be into a full blown addiction by the time they’re 16. However, officials in Lousiana, recognizing the need to curb drug problems in kids younger than those who would come to adult drug court at 17 years old, knew better: A year ago they started the Lafourche Parish Juveline Drug Court program to get younger kids the  addiction help they need.

Statistics show that the earlier alcohol and drug problems start the higher the chances of the person continuing to be an addict through adulthood. The statistics also show that the earlier the problem is caught and dealt with through addiction help, the better the chances of staying permanently clean.

A lot of parents, unfortunately, still see using drugs and, especially, alcohol, as a phase kids go through. I think the statistics speak for themselves. Getting addiction help services for kids early on will help prevent a ruined life as an adult.

Drug court is now going to be offered in Jackson County, Wisconsin. Initial approval has gone through, and start up costs have been supplied. Four officials are now training in Portland, Oregon. Soon, non-violent drug offenders in Jackson County will have the opportunity to get the addiction help they need instead of going to prison.

Judge Gerald Laabs, currently training for Drug Court Coordinator, told the press, “I was a prosecutor back in the early 1970s and now being judge, I’ve seen a huge change in that era to this era,” he said. “Back then people stole because they wanted money. Now almost 100 percent of our cases that we face deal with alcohol and drugs. That’s why we think this is an alternative that will help the public and put people back into their jobs.”

This might be surprising to some of the county’s residents - it’s primarily a rural area, about as homey as you can get. Just goes to show you that alcohol and drug addiction, and the crime associated with it, isn’t limited to the big city.

If someone you know has a problem with drugs or alcohol, help them get them the addiction help services they need now. Don’t wait for it to go to court.

Well, here we go. A doctor is being threatened by a drug company for his very public offense on a local drug called main puri, a combination of tobacco and drugs. When he began his mission, the drug was legal. Thanks to him, it is now banned. However, since the ban, the manufacturer of the drug has stepped up the threats. The doctor, Muhammad Sharif, an M.D. who runs an addiction help program in Pakistan, may have to close down his rehab center.

According to Dr. Sharif, main puri can cause mouth and throat cancer, oral cavities, and rigidity of the jaw. He’s coping with these problems in his patients every day. Let’s hope he can get enough of them through his addiction help services before they get cancer.

Dr. Sharif is not the first person, nor is his addiction help center the first organization, to be threatened one way or another by those whose profits are derived from the enslavement of others - in this case, drugs are the master. A lot of very wealthy people are supported by drug addiction and dependency, and they’ll do whatever they have to to keep those profits coming. How can you fight them? Get the people you know who have a drug problem started on the addiction help services they need. Reduce the demand.

Winchester, a New England town, has launched a campaign to protect its citizens from prescription drugs. The Winchester Medication Take Back Program encourages those with prescription drugs in their medicine cabinet to clean them out and turn them in. The idea is to keep drugs out of the water supply and landfills, and to stop young people from experimenting with them - which can lead to the need for addiction help, or worse.

 ”Unfortunately, we’re seeing more young people go down a path that’s difficult to come back from,” Liz Silva of the Substance Abuse Coalition told wbztv.com. The article goes on to say that “drug experimentation is a destructive path that often begins in a medicine cabinet at home. It’s a path that ends with addiction and sometimes death. In Winchester police are seeing teens experimenting with prescription drugs like oxycodone. ”

Winchester is not the only town with the problem - it’s happening all over the U.S.  Kids getting drugs from their parents’ medicine cabinets also sometimes wind up giving them to other kids or taking them to parties where the drugs are dumped into a bowl and everyone just takes what they want. Getting off the drugs can be hard without professional addiction help.

Of course, the kids need to be educated on the dangers of prescription drugs but, in the meantime, making them inaccessible is a good solution. Let’s hope other towns adopt a similar program - there would be a lot less need for addiction help services, and our kids would be safe.

Even though Florida is called the pill capital of the U.S., there are other States in just as much trouble. Utah is one of them, and that’s the subject of Ron Williams’ movie, Happy Valley. Williams is now travelling around Utah in the hopes of educating people about  prescription drug addiction so they will get the addiction help they need.

According to Williams, one of the major problems with prescription drug addiction is that people are reluctant to admit they have a problem and they just won’t talk about it. Unless you’re willing to do that, it’s just about impossible to get help.

I haven’t seen Happy Valley, but I would imagine that the high Mormon population, and Mormon’s teaching about drugs is linked to people not wanting to talk about it. Legal or illegal, taking unnecessary drugs is in in direct conflict with Mormon spiritual beliefs. However, as with any addict, getting addiction help services has to start with admitting to yourself, and others, that there’s a problem. Hopefully, the work Williams is doing will open people up so they can get help.

Nearly 1/2 of U.S. college students abuse alcohol or drugs at least once a month according to a recent survey but I am nevertheless surprised that the president of San Diego State University invited undercover FDA agents onto the campus. Obviously, he made this bold move in an attempt to clean the place up - get rid of drug dealers and , I would hope, make sure students get the addiction help they need.

One of the political science professors, Carole Kennedy, commented “Now it’s drugs,” she said. “Maybe next time it’s about political dissent. . . . What happens when you have students talking about federal income tax policy, saying they’re not going to pay their taxes? Are they going to bring in IRS agents?”

She’s got a point. As of just 10 years ago or so, and it may still be going on, China’s universities were loaded with informants who reported any sign of dissent to the police. Every Friday police made made their rounds of the campus to pick up kids who were reported on, threw them into a black paddy wagon and took them away. The dissenters didn’t have to do much: questioning the ideas disseminated in propaganda class - e.g. is it really true that Westerners charge their elderly parents to come to their home for a meal? - was enough. They had a similar situation in Russia where one in every four people in any room was a government informant. You can see why a political science professor would see SDSU’s move as a move towards the thought police.

Of course, we’re not talking about ‘thoughts’, we’re talking about drugs that could lead to the need for addiction help and, possibly, kill you. As a student not involved in drugs it would be good to know that someone is getting rid of drug dealers, and as a parent it would be good to know that drug dealers are not offering drugs to your college student kid.

But, as a human being, student or otherwise, it would be nice to know that your friend really is your friend and not just pretending to be so they can spy on you.

The intention of the FDA is to catch the big fish - the drug dealers who are encouraging addiction and risking the lives of other students. It could make college campuses much safer, and parents would have far less to worry about when they send their kids off to college. It might also help ensure those who already have drug problems get the addiction help services they need.

It looks like Tom Pawlenty, governor of Minnesota, is cutting the budget for drug court. Big mistake: not only will people who commit drug-related crimes wind up back on the street doing it again after a prison term, it’s going to cost the state far more money to house them as prisoners than it would have to get them the addiction help they need. And since most of them will probably wind up back in prison, the expense will be even higher.

What kind of budgeting decision is that? Okay - we’re short $1.9 million, let’s cut the things that are least expensive and in favor of those that cost more. And, in the process, let’s up the crime rate and keep more people addicted to drugs so we can increase the state expenses even further. Backward thinking.

And how does the governor propose to solve the never-ending drug/crime cycle? Drug court has not only saved many lives by offering addiction help, it’s gotten families back together, reduced crime and drug addiction.

Now it’s even more important than ever to get your friends and family the addiction help services they need - there’s a good chance they won’t get it through drug court.

We’ve heard various rumors of how terrorists are financed. According to a recent news article, the Taliban takes a 10% cut on Afghanistan’s opium production - obviously a big source of income. So, who’s financing terrorists? Everyone who uses heroin - from the hard core addict desperately in need of addiction help to the kid who buys a $2 hit of cheese heroin in the schoolyard.

Even more signficant are those who profit from it.  The article states that “In recent years, the Afghan government has rolled out plans to help wean addicts off opium and eradicate poppy fields,” and that the country “is under pressure from the international community to stop poppy cultivation.”

Let’s get real: We’re dealing with a country that supplies most of the world’s heroin. With that amount of money involved, there’s not much chance that pressure will be taken too seriously. The only thing likely to make a difference is to dry up the demand - getting everyone in the country the addiction help they need. But that’s also not likely to happen. Again, I’m sure those who are making big bucks off it will see to that.

Afghanistan, especially the southern part, has long had a casual attitude towards opium. Nearly a million people are addicted to heroin - including babies getting their thrice daily dose. The situation is so bad that many people in the country can’t really work. And the Taliban gets 10% of the take. The people are surrounded by enemies.

Isn’t that likely the future of any country with such a problem? Is the U.S. headed there with the prescription drug epidemic? Look at the lives of most heroin addicts - not a pretty site. Is there any reason to believe that OxyContin and other prescription painkillers won’t create the same lives? A country can’t be any more than the sum of it’s parts. There are a lot of reasons to ensure anyone you know with a drug problem gets addiction help services. Saving the country might be one of them.

The recent death of a 16-year-old girl provides an excellent example of why people have to be warned about the dangers of methadone: Two girls living at a facility for teen substance abuser stole methadone from an employee. Not getting high as they had obviously expected to, the girls continued to take more methadone throughout the night, eventually fell into a coma, and one died. Obviously, both girls were in need of addiction help and neither should have been exposed to any drugs.

Karla Ramirez, the aunt of the girl who is in recovery, explained, ”When the effects didn’t hit right away, they just kept taking more pills. They had no idea what they were dealing with.”

And that pretty much sums up the methadone problem - people just don’t know what they’re dealing with. It’s a tricky drug. You don’t feel the usual effects you would expect from an opiate, other than having it kill pain, and, consequently, either take more methadone or take another drug on top of it. This results in overdose and, sometimes, death. They go to sleep and never wake up.

Another unfortunate result of this incident is that the home where this occured will no longer have people who need addiction help services referred there by officials in New Jersey or Pennsylvania, and another group home was also cut off. How many people won’t be able to get the addiction help they need due to the criminal neglect of one employee?

The facility is no longer  

T, but rather than getting the help they need

According to Police Chief Alan Watson of Talladega, Alabama, about 90% of the crimes in the area are drug-related. From thefts and burglaries to domestic violence or homicides, Chief Watson can pretty much count on some connection to drugs. He says it’s a nationwide problem - and the number of people in jail for drug related crimes can attest to that - and that we need more prisons and more addiction help.

In fact, if we had adequate addiction help services available, we could do away with some of the prisons - every crime has a motive, and drugs provide some of the strongest motivation around. One that motive is removed, a crime-free life usually follows.

How does drug addiction cause crime? First of all, someone on drugs really isn’t themselves. Otherwise wonderful people can get very nasty and irrational, and sometimes violent, when they’re drinking - and the same is true of drugs. However, drugs add some other elements that are often not present with alcohol: Alcohol is cheap, there aren’t too many people trying to figure out how to get $600 a day to support an alcohol problem. Also, unless you’re a died in the wool alcoholic craving another drink with every fiber of your being, you also don’t feel like you’re going to snap unless you get more. Drug addicts get desperate, very desperate and, as is well known, many drug addicts will do anything they have to to get their next hit.

That is not to say that alcohol isn’t dangerous - it is. And there’s a lot of alcohol-related crime as well.

Whatever the addiction, drugs or alcohol, and no matter how serious the crime, if the guy’s going back out onto the street, you’d better make sure he’s also gotten the addiction help services he needs.  Otherwise, there’s a good chance he’ll be right back into drugs and right back into a life of crime to support his habit. And, yes, then we’ll need more prisons.