HELP THE ADDICTS

Emergency Treatment Center Needed

Out of sight, out of mind.

That's pretty much the attitude in Manatee County toward substance
abusers who represent a threat to themselves and those around them.
Call the cops, throw them in jail and refer them to AA or NA after
they dry out.

Trouble is, that policy doesn't do much to help addicts stay clean,
sober and safe for any length of time. Once the addicts are released
from jail - or the hospital if they were in bad enough shape to be
admitted - most resume their destructive lifestyle, and the revolving
door from street to jail to street keeps spinning until they overdose
or commit a major crime.

The out-of-sight, out-of-mind policy also pushes a huge unfunded
burden off on law enforcement, the Manatee County jail and Manatee
Memorial Hospital. Patrol officers who should be preventing crime or
apprehending criminals are forced to spend too much time arresting and
transporting addicts. The jail must use space and resources intended
for criminal suspects as a holding pen for addicts. Or the hospital,
already burdened with unfunded treatment of the indigent ill, must
find secure space and health professionals to keep them safe while
they dry out.

That's why the current efforts by advocates for the mentally ill and
substance abusers to establish a treatment facility are so welcome.
They are seeking $824,000 to set up a three-bed emergency response
center within the Manatee Glens mental health complex in east
Bradenton. The facility would provide a centrally located place for
law enforcement officers to take addicts in need of emergency care, a
place, unlike the county jail, that is equipped to handle their
specific mental health needs.

The funding would enable Manatee Glens to operate the center for one
year. It would act as a pilot program for possible expansion after
officials assess the center's success rate. Based on statistics, three
beds wouldn't begin to handle the true scope of the addiction problem.
The pilot program would provide resources to treat 300 patients a
year, Glens officials say, while the need is closer to 2,400 a year,
or 200 each month.

But it would be a start. It would offer harried police and sheriff's
deputies an appropriate option when they encounter addicts needing
care. It would make local streets a bit safer. And it would help some
of the unfortunate addicts get the long-term treatment they need to
stay clean and sober - a problem that the community also must address
at some point. For it's only long-term treatment that will truly help
substance abusers kick their addictions, and Manatee Glens is woefully
underfunded to provide the treatment programs needed.

The $824,000 for the center's first year should be considered an
investment in prevention. Just applying the money saved in police,
hospital and jail resources to the addiction emergency facility should
go a long way toward meeting its first-year costs. We need this
facility. Drug and alcohol abuse is a problem that is not going to go
away; it is only going to get worse.