SOLVING DRUG ADDICTION IS NOT A CASE OF EITHER/OR

Steve Austin's Aug. 25 letter about the Insite supervised injection
site shows he has enough social conscience to make him hate but,
sadly, not enough to make him love (or even think clearly).

He appears to believes mental illness and end-stage substance abuse
are caused by moral weakness. His solution has an equally Victorian
ring to it: Lock 'em up.

He spoke of "harm elimination," brilliant in its simplicity.

Why didn't we think of it before? Hang on. We did. Wasn't it called
Prohibition? That was such a success, we didn't try it again until the
hugely effective "war on drugs."

Drug addiction is a complex human problem; it can only be addressed by
multi-layered approaches. One size certainly does not fit all.

Law enforcement is undeniably part of the solution, but so is adequate
housing, harm reduction and, perhaps above everything else, treatment.
(It's an illness, dummy.)

Taken out of context, any of these approaches can be made to seem
ineffective. It isn't a matter of policing over Insite; it's a matter
of both.

A bit of compassion wouldn't hurt, either.

Dr. Michael Seear

B.C. Children's Hospital

Vancouver