FORMER ADDICTS ADVOCATE ADDICTION EDUCATION

Recovering Addicts Team Up With Police to Educate, Rock
Out

Former addicts and current police officers make strange bedfellows,
but they're teaming up this week in recognition of Addiction Awareness
Week (Nov. 18 to 24) and a new ad campaign aimed at youth promoting
the effects of addiction not just on the addicts, but society as a
whole.

The Recovering Addicts Fellowship Team (RAFT), a support group for
recovering addicts made up of recovering addicts, has partnered with
the RNC to promote the Faces Of Addiction poster campaign, which is
aimed at youth in Grade 8 and up.

They're also working together to hold the Addictions Awareness Week
Maze, also aimed at educating youth about addictions and their
consequences.

"It's a very unlikely partnership - you have your previous drug addict
who has had a criminal charge now partnered up with a local law
enforcement officer, going into schools talking about drugs," said
RAFT member Brock Ballard.

Ballard says the education on addiction has changed from enforcement
of the laws about drugs to knowledge about the effects of addiction,
which he thinks is a better approach.

"The drug awareness officer of the RNC is Constable Steve Knight, and
this is a new position at the RNC. He's there so they're approachable
- - he's not enforcement, he's about awareness and he's going to be
teaching about addictions also," said Ballard.

"A lot of it is harm reduction, things are not as black and white as
they used to be in the dark ages, as I like to say. It's a lot of harm
reduction, because some people are able to drink responsibly."

Though Ballard has no specific statistics on addiction and drugs for
the province, he does know that the time for warnings about crystal
meth coming to the province is over - the drug is already here.

"Just recently there was a seizure of ecstasy, which is very popular
in high schools, but there was no ecstasy in the pills, it was 100 per
cent crystal meth," he said.

"We're getting six to eight phone calls now a week on crystal meth -
when we started up four years ago, nobody talked about crystal meth.
So crystal meth is here but people don't realize they're using it."

Though many believe addictions are limited to gambling, drugs, and
alcohol, Ballard says people can become addicted to things like their
Blackberry or video games, too, and that no one is immune to the
affects of addiction.

"I know a lot of people have this misconception that 'It doesn't
affect me.' But we have people who have strong addictions in the
community and they have to feed their addictions somehow, so they're
stealing, so then prices of things go up," said Ballard. "They make
the areas unsafe because this is where they're at, and they're hanging
out in certain areas of town, maybe, and that makes it a little less
desirable to be in."

Recovering addicts are welcome to call RAFT's 24-hour help line when
they want to talk to someone who's been there, but for people who need
help with their addictions, Ballard recommends talking to your doctor
or calling Addiction Services (709-752-4919) instead.

"The first part of getting help for yourself is recognizing that there
is a problem, and once you've recognized there is a problem you have a
really good chance of helping yourself get help for it - putting it
into a rest so that you're not active. Once you've been an addict to
something you usually are for the rest of your life," said Ballard.

"We tend to be a place that people can call because you're dealing
with people who've already done it, so they can call us."

Other events RAFT are holding for Addiction Awareness Week include the
Walk for Recovery at MUN's Field House at 10:30 am on Saturday, Nov.
24, and the FIRST Concert for Recovery with Billy and the Bruisers and
Siochana on Sunday, Nov. 25.

RAFT is looking at future team-ups with law enforcement, specifically
a concert next summer held in conjunction with the Royal Canadian
Mounted Police, featuring Sixx AM, a side project of Motley Crue
guitarist Nikki Sixx.

"Nikki Sixx wrote a book called [The] Heroin Diaries, and he has a
band called Sixx AM, which is the soundtrack to the book, and they're
doing a tour - 25 per cent of those proceeds go to the Covenant House,
which he's a survivor of. Also there's a Canadian band called Three
Days Grace, one of these guys . he was addicted to Oxycontin, so this
album is all about recovery," said Ballard.

"We're trying to do that next summer, and that's partnered with the
RCMP. Strange partnerships."

For more information about RAFT call 738-RAFT, or check out their
website at http://www.raft-nf.com/default.html.