RED RIBBON WEEK: COCAINE'S POPULARITY FUELS NEW APPROACHES TO SOBRIETY

Counties Look to Drug Courts As Scientists Test Vaccines

When he finally decided to kick his crack habit, Ted Forrester found
strength in a higher power. After three decades of abusing drugs and
alcohol, the Phenix City man turned his life over to God and headed
down a new path.

"Drugs was just as a symptom of a bigger problem," Forrester said. "I
haven't touched it since."

While Forrester has been drug free since 2004, countless cocaine and
crack addicts have tried and failed to get clean, succumbing to
cravings and stumbling into relapse.

What works for one addict may be lost on another, and just as each
user turned to drugs for different reasons, there also are various
routes to quitting.

Cocaine use, by all accounts, remains widespread despite myriad
efforts to forestall drug abuse. The National Survey on Drug Use and
Health estimated in 2008 that 1.9 million Americans had used cocaine
in the past month.

Nearly 360,000 of those reported using crack.

The ubiquity of the drug -- and its impact on society -- has fueled
some innovative approaches toward finding solutions:

Cocaine vaccines

Scientists are increasingly optimistic that a cocaine vaccine may one
day help with addiction. Early this year, researchers announced an
anti-cocaine immunity found among mice that were given a vaccine that
combined the common cold virus with a particle mimicking cocaine.

Mice receiving the shot appeared less hyperactive after ingesting
doses of cocaine compared to their unvaccinated counterparts.

"Our very dramatic data shows that we can protect mice against the
effects of cocaine," Ronald G. Crystal of Weill Cornell Medical
College said when the study was released in January, "and we think
this approach could be very promising in fighting addiction in humans."

While they're being tested in humans, the vaccines haven't been
approved for commercial use.

The idea behind the shot is to wipe out the "high" that cocaine users
experience by creating antibodies that attach to the drug and stop it
from reaching the brain. Some observers have voiced concern that the
shot won't eliminate cravings associated with addiction, and that
vaccinated users might overdose trying to get high.

Researchers have stressed the vaccine would be reserved for addicts
serious about quitting, and that it would be combined with other forms
of treatment. A viable vaccine could be life-changing for addicts who
just can't seem to stop, scientists say.

"People have been trying for years now to find a treatment and none of
them has worked," said Dr. Eugene Somoza, a professor of clinical
psychiatry at the University of Cincinnati and director of the
Cincinnati Addiction Research Center who is testing a cocaine vaccine.
"You can't go see a therapist every week or two weeks for the next 40
years."

Another possibility, Somoza said, may be "to just create the
antibodies themselves."

Drug courts

With prisons brimming, financially strapped states and municipalities
are increasingly turning to alternative sentencing for criminal
defendants charged with cocaine and other drug-related offenses. Court
officials on both sides of the Chattahoochee River say they've seen
encouraging numbers from drug courts.

Even with the rise of methamphetamine abuse, they still see a steady
stream of crack and powder cocaine cases, as well as other drugs like
marijuana.

"The whole concept is that rather than incarcerate everyone, you try
to provide treatment in lieu of incarceration," said District Judge
Michael J. Bellamy, who presides over adult and juvenile drug courts
in Russell County. "The stats show clearly that 75 to 80 percent of
the people that are in jail are there as a result of addiction. If you
can address the problem, you eliminate them from being part of the
system and the cycle."

Judges in both counties said they're starting to see cases in which
juveniles are given marijuana blunts on the street that are laced with
cocaine, apparently as a means of enhancing the euphoria. Some insist
they've never used cocaine but test positive for it during screenings.

Mary Bode, who oversees drug court in Muscogee County, said a number
of children get involved with drugs to cope with grief or abuse issues
at home.

"A lot of them just want to get high so they don't hurt emotionally,"
she said. "We engage the entire family to fix the underlying problem
that is causing the child to use drugs."

Grassroots groups

The Rev. Willie Phillips of the south Columbus Neighborhood Watch
program Winterfield on the Move Against Drugs knows crack cocaine is a
threat to his community, which straddles North Lumpkin and Cusseta
Roads.

"I ride the neighborhood so I know all the crack houses, and I follow
them to the crack houses, and I see them go in and buy it and come
back out," he said.

Each time he nails down a specific location, he passes that
information to the police. "I call the detectives and let them know
what house is suspicious, what I've seen, and let them handle it."

The police depend on residents like Phillips to help them clean up
areas that have become havens for drug dealers, said Capt. Gil
Slouchick of the Columbus Police Department's Special Operations Unit,
which conducts drug raids in Muscogee County.

"To get rid of those, you have to have the help of the people in the
neighborhoods," he said. "They're not responsible for cleaning it up,
but they have to give us a helping hand."

But getting neighbors to form a group to fight a network of drug
dealers can be difficult, Phillips said. "In this part of town, it's
hard to get one started because people don't like to snitch on one
another, and that's why in this part of town you have that bad problem
because everybody wants to go in their house and lock the doors.
Nobody wants to get involved."

It takes leadership, commitment and strength, he said. "With someone
that's strong in a neighborhood working with law enforcement, you can
get rid of the problem," Phillips said.

Residents become intimidated, anticipating retaliation from armed,
territorial criminals if witnesses cooperate with police. "If people
come together, they don't have to be afraid of the drug dealers,"
Phillips said. "Drug dealers are just as a afraid of the neighbors as
anybody."

The police can't do it alone, Slouchick said. "People have to try to
take back their neighborhoods and allow us to help them, because
without them, we can go out there and put people in jail over and over
and over again, but we'll never be able to eradicate it from a
neighborhood without the help of the neighbors."

Columbus residents interested in initiating a Neighborhood Watch
program in their area may call the Crime Prevention Unit at
706-653-3173.