OFFICIALS CONSIDER METHADONE CLINICS FOR AREA

Daily trips to Charleston or Savannah could end soon for recovering drug
abusers taking methadone to break the habit. Two methadone clinics have
been proposed for Beaufort and Jasper counties, state officials say.

Methadone is a drug given to former opiate addicts to break their
dependency on substances such as heroin, morphine, OxyContin and other
opioid drugs. The treatment eliminates the withdrawal symptoms for between
24 and 36 hours when given daily, according to the federal Office of
National Drug Control Policy.

State officials don't know how many people need the service. But both of
the local clinic applications said the facilities were expected to serve
between 100 and 150 patients by the end of the first year of operation. The
clinic proposed by Choices Inc., a Pennsylvania-based for-profit company,
would be in Sheridan Park off U.S. 278 in greater Bluffton. The clinic
proposed by Recovery Concepts, a for-profit group run by doctors and
pharmacists from South Carolina, would be in an office complex on Boardwalk
Drive off of S.C. 170 in Jasper County.

Albert Whiteside, director of the state Department of Health and
Environmental Control's Division of Planning and Certificate of Need, which
issues permits for methadone clinics, said he thought the state would
approve only one of the clinics since the area's demand is unknown. He said
the closest treatment centers were in Charleston and Savannah.

Dr. William M. Scott III, a medical director for methadone clinics in
Anderson and Greenville and a member of the group seeking to open the
clinic off S.C. 170, said the real need in the area stems from prescription
drug users, not heroin users. The group hopes to get approval from the
state and open the clinic in the fall.

"It's hard to know the real need because it's so clandestine," Scott said.
"We need to look at this not as .... 'these are bad people.' These are
people with a medical addiction."

He said most insurance companies don't cover methadone treatment, which
runs about $300 a month. But insurance does cover several other medications
the clinic would use to treat addicts, such as Buprenorphine.

Whiteside said based on the numbers from the Charleston area clinics about
a half-dozen Beaufort County residents travel to Charleston to get daily
doses of methadone. Officials with the only methadone clinic in Savannah
said Thursday they typically have about 24 patients from Beaufort County
each day.

As of December 2003, about 2,200 people in South Carolina were receiving
treatment from methadone clinics, according to state statistics.

Bud Boyne, executive director of the Beaufort County Alcohol and Drug Abuse
Department, said the agency gets about six calls a year from people looking
for methadone treatment. But he said that number may be low because people
know the department doesn't provide treatment.

Boyne said the main drugs abused in Beaufort County are alcohol, marijuana
and crack.

Nine methadone clinics are permitted and operating in South Carolina: two
each in Charleston and Greenville, and one each in Columbia, West Columbia,
Anderson, Spartanburg and Myrtle Beach.