TRYING TO MAKE SENSE OF SENSELESS WAR ON DRUGS

When college basketball star Len Bias died of a cocaine overdose in
1986, his senseless death marked the beginning of the "war on drugs."

Now, we can make the senseless death of young Charity Bowers in Peru
mark the end of a policy that contradicts the very spirit of her name
(see Charles Kiker's April 27 guest column, "War on drugs a battle
the nation can't afford to win").

We should demand that our government stop defining drug abuse as a
crime to be fought with police, military and "collateral damage" and
insist that it start defining drug abuse as an illness to be
addressed by medical and public health professionals.

In the name of Charity, we should spend the billions of tax dollars
wasted on prisons and ineffective interdiction on more cost-effective
and compassionate treatment and rehabilitation.

The deeply religious families of Charity and her mother, Veronica,
believe that God's reason for taking their loved ones will one day
become clear to them. If people of good will open their hearts and
speak their minds, a reason for these tragic deaths might become
clear to us all.

Jane Marcus
Palo Alto, Calif.