Dear Editor,

Your editorial on drug treatment costs and the need to spend tax dollars on
effective drug rehab programs (Top Problem, NDN 24 April) is the kind of
probing editorializing that good newspapers engage in; looking behind the
hype for less obvious factors bearing on the problem.

Not many people know that everyone arrested for criminal possession of
illegal drugs is automatically treated as if they are addicted to the drug
found in their possession. In lieu of jail or prison time, first time
offenders are frequently offered drug rehab to cure their so-called
"addiction" problem.

The truth is that a small percentage of drug users are addicted to the drugs
they choose to use recreationally, illegal or otherwise. Imagine treating
everyone who emerged from a liquor store with alcohol in their possession as
an alcoholic, and requiring them to complete drug rehab or go to prison.
Pretty silly, even though alcohol is society's most problematic recreational
drug by an exponential factor.

Correcting this misdirection of precious tax dollars would mean a likely
abundance of drug rehab money for treating those arrested who are truly
addicted and in need of medical attention. As we turn from incarceration to
treatment for the medical problems caused by drug use, we must factor common
sense into the drug rehab equation, or treatment will become the same
bottomless money pit that interdiction and incarceration have become.

sincerely, Arthur Sobey