NEEDED: DRUG POLICY

There has to be a better way for the state to formulate drug policy
than for the governor and the Legislature to be squabbling over
treatment protocols.

Yet that's what was happening last week after senators proposed
changes in regulations that would allow some patients using methadone
as a heroin substitute to take their methadone home with them.

No way, said Gov. Howard Dean, worried that methadone would find its
way onto the illicit drug market.

Of course, methadone would probably be abused. People seeking a high
find a way to abuse all sorts of things. College students have found
novel uses for Ritalin, which is widely prescribed to calm down
hyperactive children.

But who is right on the question of methadone? The governor or the
senators, who argue that methadone users can be tested and that
allowing them to take the drug home facilitates effective use?

It's hard to say. But if the state had already developed a
forward-thinking and comprehensive drug-control policy, questions of
drug treatment would not become a topic of political debate. They
would be resolved by experts outside the political sphere who had
explored the best programs, therapies, and drug regimens, and put in
place the best means of controlling drug addiction. The views of
disinterested experts would inspire more confidence than the views
expressed by feuding politicians.

At the federal level Sen. Patrick Leahy has introduced a bill that
would add federal resources to the battle to control drugs. The bill
provides significant money to help states establish treatment for
juveniles, prisoners, women with children, and others. It also calls
for consideration of enhanced penalties, and it provides money for
education and prevention, for drug courts, and for scientific research.

Leahy's bill would go a long way to help a state like Vermont take on
the costly problem of drug abuse.

But Vermont needs to take the lead. Dean has proposed a $2.6-million,
two-year program to expand treatment, enforcement, and education.

It is a good first step, but there is a sense that Dean is trying to
catch up on the issue. Once his administration, or that of a new
governor, puts an aggressive and thoughtful drug-control policy into
place, politicians won't have to bicker about who gets to carry
methadone home with them.