ADDICTION STIGMA STILL ALIVE, WELL

At one time in my active addiction, I was so desperate to escape the
cycle of getting and using and finding ways and means to get more, I
considered enrolling in a methadone program in Knoxville.

I went so far as to go by the methadone clinic in Knoxville and
inquire about the waiting list for enrolling in the program. At the
time, it was a week to 10 days before I could get started, too long
for an opiate addict to wait.

Today, I'm grateful I didn't go through with it. I'm not disparaging
methadone clinics -- far be it for me to judge what might work for
another addict -- but for me, getting on methadone would have been
trading one addiction for another. Instead of paying money to a
street dealer, I would have been paying it to the government for the
same result -- dependence on a chemical.

I was reminded of that last week when I read an Associated Press
story about how Appalachian communities are protesting methadone
clinics in their communities. Several years ago, the scourge of
Oxycontin made methadone clinics an acceptable alternative to the
crime and death that Oxycontin was causing in so many small towns in
Kentucky, Virginia and West Virginia.

Not so any more. According to the AP, some 300 people, many carrying
anti-methadone placards, protested outside Middlesboro City Hall last
week against a proposed methadone clinic. Mac Bell, state narcotic
authority administrator in the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family
Services, said the opposition to the Middlesboro clinic has been overwhelming.

Opponents cite the location of the proposed clinic -- one block from
a Catholic school, three blocks from a public elementary school and
right in the middle of a shopping area. "The location is terrible,"
claims Dr. Ronald Dubin, a physician who leads a group involved in
the Middlesboro fight who told AP that a methadone clinic would make
the city near the Tennessee border a magnet for addicts from other
parts of central Appalachia.

I wonder -- would Dr. Dubin and the opponents of the proposed
methadone clinic say the same thing if it was a hospital or a
dialysis clinic that wanted to open in that Middlesboro neighborhood?

Something tells me the answer is no. And that saddens me, because
it's another sign that the public stigma about addiction is still
alive and well in this country. The opposition to such clinics is
rooted in fear and misunderstanding, and it shows that many people
think of addicts not as sick individuals, but as drug-crazed
criminals who are a danger to the community.

The truth is much more complex than that.

Yes, in my active addiction, I was willing to do whatever it took to
get drugs, including crime. With my addiction in check, however, I'm
just like any other person with a chronic illness -- a diabetic, for
example, or someone with Hepatitis C. As long as I'm doing what I
need to do to keep my disease in check, then I'm not a danger to
myself or others.

Recovery is what works for me, and although I feel methadone was the
wrong choice for me, I can't argue with statistics. Clients pay about
$85 a week for methadone, drug screening and counseling at the
clinics. One OxyContin pill purchased on the black market can cost
that much, the AP reported. The number of methadone clinics has grown
nationwide from 775 to 1,100 over the past 12 years, according to the
American Association for the Treatment of Opioid Dependence in New
York. The number of people being treated has grown from 115,000 to
205,000 over the same period.

For their own reasons, other addicts are choosing methadone over
recovery, and those who do often find that it's the only thing that
keeps their addiction at bay. Unfortunately, many in society still
look at addiction as a moral failing or a lack of willpower on the
part of the addict.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Such opinions make it that
much harder for addicts to admit they have a problem and seek help,
which is why so many others, including myself, find that recovery is
the only alternative. It's a collection of people just like me,
suffering from the same disease I do, banding together to keep our
illnesses in check. There's no magic pill to cure addiction, just
like methadone doesn't cure it, but it does arrest our disease and
gives us the opportunity to build a life better than we could have
ever imagined.