AHS Views

The state of Alabama will be opening 25 additional drug courts to help non-violent drug offenders get out of the correctional system once and for all. The drug courts will allow offenders to do supervised long-term drug rehab programs along with regular drug testing.

The 25 new drug courts being the total to 41 for Alabama – the goal is at least one drug court in every county, a goal no other state has attained. If the participants stay clean for one year, their charges will be dropped.

The courts are already seeing positive results. In fact, a recent article reported that that the recidivism rate for graduates of the program was only 9%. It also saved the state over $36 million in prison costs.

If drug courts continue to get great results through successful drug rehab programs, it’s quite possible that other states will follow Alabama’s lead.

When a person goes into drug rehab they’ve often just been through a major problem like a fight with a family member or a divorce. Sometimes these problems are the reasons they turned to alcohol or drugs but, of course, they don’t solve anything. In fact, they make the situations worse. But sometimes a successful drug rehab program can help solve those problems, as it may well do for Lindsay Lohan.

Lohan is in drug rehab for the third time now and, according to a recent article, she’s agreed to see her father as part of the healing process. There’s been a lot of buzz in the media that Lohan’s addiction was caused by her father’s drug and alcohol problems. She hasn’t spoken to him in years.

Maybe meeting with her father will help handle their differences and Lohan can finally get through a drug rehab program successfully.

I look at my life and, really, there’s no problem that wouldn’t absolutely go away 100% if I had a bottomless checkbook. I guess I should consider myself lucky because there seems to be no end to the problems of the rich-and-famous - including alcohol and drug abuse - and money doesn’t seem to be doing an awful lot for them. But they can afford the most expensive, most luxurious treatment facilities – the fees are more per month than most people earn in a year - and yet they continue to live tortured lives, and often die a very ugly death. The pity is that the problems leading to their alcohol or drug addiction may have been resolved had they gone to the right drug rehab program.

The link above goes to pictures of many famous people who died of drug-related causes. Many of them overdosed, and some died from complications from alcohol or drug abuse. One died in an assisted suicide – with morphine. I’ll bet you can’t guess who that was – Sigmund Freud. The father of psychoanalysis: the one field that is supposed to be able to help a person resolve the personal issues that lead to alcoholism and drug addiction and, I would assume, the desire to kill yourself.

If you or someone you care about is looking for a treatment facility, don’t just go to the one down the street, or the one that’s least expensive, or most expensive, check out your options and find one with a good success rate. You might not be rich and famous, but that doesn’t mean you’re not going to go down the same torturous path as these celebrities if you don’t find a successful drug rehab program.

Many communities object to having drug rehab centers, halfway houses – anything to do with drug or alcohol treatment, actually – in their neighborhood. In just the last two days I’ve read news articles about public concern over treatment centers in Arizona, Oregon, and California. Three states that are in serious need of drug rehab programs.

I understand the reluctance. The idea of having your kid playing out in the front yard and being approached by an alcoholic or drug addict is a little frightening. And we may be perfectly upstanding law-abiding citizens ourselves who don’t drink very much, don’t take drugs and are contributing members of society and we want to live in communities with people like ourselves.

On the other hand, there’s really no getting away from the drug problem. And, one way or another, it’s going to impact your life. It may not be now, but if it keeps accelerating, it will eventually. And the only way it’s going to stop accelerating is if perfectly upstanding law-abiding citizens who are productive members of society reach out and help.

It may not be by voting for a halfway house to be opened next door, but there might other things you can do to contribute to the establishment of a successful drug rehab program. Get constructive. Get with your city council and see what you can do about solving the problem – you and your family will benefit in the end.

An recent article reported that a former Navy hospital ship, left in port in Baltimore, was auctioned off yesterday for $50,000. The ship was seized by federal marshals in March and auctioned by the US District Court to pay off debts owed by the former owner who had planned to convert the ship into a floating drug rehab center.

A floating drug rehab center? At first that sounds like a strange idea but some of the major problems associated with addicts during treatment would be solved by drug addiction treatment in the middle of the ocean.

Anyone who has had a loved one go through drug rehab knows how hard it can be to get the person to agree to stay in the program once they’ve started. It would be impossible to leave this one.

This would also be very helpful for the drug rehab staff. The ship would leave with a full boat of clients and return a month later, with clients rehabilitated and happy. And just image how secure it would be: there would be no concern about visitors or outsiders trying to bring drugs into the center.

Unfortunately, there was no report on what the new owner plans to do with the ship but I am still hoping that someone will turn it into a unique location for a successful drug rehab program.

Seems Amy’s changed her mind again: After a 3-day binge on drugs and alcohol that ended in the hospital, Amy Winehouse and her husband have headed to a U.S. drug treatment program to kick the habit. An article in the Post Chronicle reports that Winehouse and her husband agreed to go into drug rehab after their families had it out about their shared addictions.

It’s great they’ve decided to get help but couples doing rehab together reduces their chance of success: one person might decide to not complete the program, or will relapse after leaving the treatment center – and that influences the other.

One of the reasons Winehouse’s overdose and potential admission into drug rehab has gotten so much press is because of her song “Rehab”. She says in the song that she’ll never go into rehab. In a recent news report she said rehab is a cop-out.

Let’s hope she really has changed her mind and will get through a successful drug rehab program. Otherwise, her most recent songs may be among her last.

The cheese heroin deaths of two dozen children has prompted a $100 million federal grant for school districts in Dallas/Ft. Worth to educate children and parents on the dangers of the drug, according to a recent news article in the Carrollton Leader. While education certainly helps, the program unfortunately does not include drug rehab.

“There are not many treatment centers, and most of those that are on the voluntary basis are very expensive and out of the reach of some of our parents,” said Charles Cole, an assistant superintendent in a local school district. “That’s why we try to educate our parents on some things that they can do that would be helpful.”

Cheese heroin is heroin cut, or mixed with, less potent drugs such as Tylenol. The combination is perceived as less dangerous than heroin, but the number of overdose deaths in the area certainly doesn’t support that perception.

Education will help fight the drug, and fewer people will get hooked. But if some of that $100 million was spent on a successful drug rehab program, it would also help those who are currently addicted, and prevent deaths from overdose.

Drug addiction in South Africa is growing, and its victims are getting younger and younger. In an effort to reduce the number of addicts in the country, more and more drug treatment centers are opening. But, if you are looking for help, beware, because bogus treatment centers are sprouting up all over South Africa in an effort to take advantage of the growing number of addicts in the country. You have to look hard to find a successful drug rehab program.

A recent article reports that several unregistered drug rehab centers have opened in the Durban and KwaZulu-Natal, both of which are located on the southeastern coastline. The concern with the centers is that they are administering drugs to addicts, and “endangering their lives,” according to the director of the South African National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence.

In South Africa, drug rehab programs are required to register with the Department of Social Welfare and Development and every registered center is issued a practice number. The United States has similar registration requirements.

When looking for a good treatment center, is it very important to check out the credentials and licensing certificates of the program to ensure you are going into a legitimate, trustworthy drug rehab program.

I just read an article about several car accidents caused by patients on their way home from a clinic where they received methadone. The most recent accident involved a 22-year-old man killing a woman and her 3-year-old granddaughter when he ran off the road through two yards and a fence. Is this what happens when methadone is substituted for heroin instead of getting someone into a drug rehab center where they can actually get off drugs?

This is far from the first such accident.  The police chief said he’s aware of several others: One person was pulled over because they’d been driving on the wrong side of the road for four miles, another was involved in two accidents on the way home from the clinic, and another died after hitting another car head on. These aren’t the only incidents, and all of them happened on the way home from the clinic.

Amazingly enough, the law seems to be on the side of the people causing the accidents. One person whose car was crashed into when another driver crossed the center line into his lane tried to sue the person’s psychiatrist for not telling the patient not to drive. Unfortunately, the case was dismissed because the judge felt it was in the public interest to support people who want to get off heroin.

I do too. But what about the ‘public interest’ of those who aren’t addicted to drugs – are their rights suspended?

I know that some people think they need methadone to function normally in life. But functioning normally doesn’t include killing people. If someone would offer methadone addicts the opportunity for a successful drug rehab program, we’d all be safer.

Sometimes people addicted to drugs can get pretty desperate, but this one brings desperation to a whole new level. A recent article tells the story of a 37-year-old man who was arrested in May when he stole money from poor boxes in a church where he used to be an altar boy. The money was used to buy heroin. He’s been arrested 10 times for drug-related offenses, but says he has been clean and sober since June 4th when he checked into detox. Hopefully, he’ll follow it up with a successful drug rehab program that enables him to fully recover.

At the hearing, he said he shouldn’t have stolen from the poor boxes but he nevertheless pleaded not guilty to three counts of petty larceny and one count of criminal mischief. He said he was on a drug binge. He stole $8 one day, $22 the next and an unknown amount on the third. He also expressed remorse, saying, “I screwed up and I am sorry.”
 
The man’s bail was set at $4,500.00, which was posted by a friend of the family. He’s due to go back to court in August. There was no mention of whether he would undergo further drug rehab.