FUNDING FOR DRUG TREATMENT A CHALLENGE

Moyers Addresses Advocates in City

WORCESTER -- As a teenager, it started with his love of marijuana. By
college, he was binge drinking and using heavy drugs. In his 30s, he
was a writer for CNN, a family man and a crack cocaine addict.
Finally, he went through rehabilitation, came out the other side and
is now an advocate to help others.

This is William C. Moyers' story. Clean since 1993, he is the
executive director of public advocacy for the Minneapolis-based
Hazelden clinic.

Friday morning in a banquet room at Worcester's Beechwood Hotel, Mr.
Moyer stood in a packed room of local health care advocates, medical
doctors, researchers and legislators. His story is simple: motivate
his fellow alcohol and drug treatment advocates in educating the
public that addiction is a treatable disease and to get ready to
fight for funding if national health care reform becomes a reality.

But Massachusetts faces a stiff headwind of declining tax revenue,
rising unemployment, bloated government deficits, and a perception
that substance abuse treatment is a revolving door with little
success. This leaves some health care providers with the sobering
thought of how to do more with less money in the cookie jar.

"Whenever health care reform comes, it's going to require all
diseases have evidence-based practices and evidence-based outcomes
that work," Mr. Moyers said. "The addiction field has been woefully
behind the curve."

Stigma is also an issue in the battle for funding, said Mr. Moyers,
author of The New York Times bestseller "Broken: My Story of
Addiction and Recovery" and the son of journalist Bill Moyers. The
aura of crime, homelessness and family abuse is a barrier to some
taxpayers who see drug use as a choice.

But Mr. Moyers sees it differently. "There are people whose behavior
has led to lung cancer. It's called smoking. We don't deny smokers
access to lung cancer treatment just because they smoked."

Janice B. Yost, president and CEO of The Health Foundation of Central
Massachusetts, believes the public needs to be educated. "Not
everyone responds to the same treatment," she said. "If it were
cancer, a doctor might say, 'We'll try this and if that doesn't work,
we'll try something else.' But substance abuse has the stigma that,
after one treatment, you should be cured."

However, finding a way to pay for these services is a challenge.
State Rep. Robert A. DeLeo, D-Revere, said that, as chairman of the
House Ways and Means Committee, he supports state-funded mental
health and substance abuse services but is trying to duck from the
budget-cut hatchet. "The downward economy has affected us all," he
said to the group, "but as in most cases, it has hit the vulnerable
and the sick particularly hard. And the situation, I would dare say,
seems to be getting somewhat more challenging."

In addition, he said, the state spends more than $457 million on
services including child and adolescent mental health care, not just
drug and alcohol treatment. But with declining tax revenues, the
state needs to cut $675 million from the budget. How much will be cut
from social services is not yet known. "Next fiscal year," he said
with a warning, "will probably be the greatest challenge we've ever faced."

State Rep. George N. Peterson Jr., R-Grafton, said he believes the
funding should be a government priority and he is supportive of
raising taxes on some revenue sources, such as alcohol, so long as
the money is spent wisely. "The problem I have in most cases is that
in other programs we have failed that mission," he said. When too
much money is raised, the surplus is often funneled to something
unrelated, he said.

Mr. Moyers said the trick is to successfully win national funding,
and with President Obama making health care reform a priority, time
might be running short.

What is the alternative if they don't get what they need from Washington?

"Plan B is to do it on the grass roots, to continue the message of
hope and help and healing, to continue to engage policymakers in
meaningful reform at the state level," Mr. Moyers said.