PLEASE DON'T MIS-REGULATE METHADONE CLINICS

The West Virginia Methadone Advocacy Project is an organization whose
mission is to promote recovery from opiate addiction through the use of
methadone maintenance treatment.

We oppose House of Delegates Bill 4387.

Federal regulations are based on the experience and knowledge of the
methadone maintenance treatment community for over 30 years, and were
adopted to strictly control the dispensing of methadone to addicts, to
assure that clinics were accredited independently to high standards, and to
eliminate expensive and unneeded layers of bureaucracy.

The wording of this bill, which calls for the "Secretary of the Department
of Health and Human Resources to promulgate emergency rules to govern
Methadone Clinics" implies that there is an emergency situation in this
state when nothing could be farther from the truth.

By keeping it simple from the start, the secretary and his adult treatment
director have created an atmosphere of quality methadone maintenance
treatment in West Virginia, with one of the highest standards of patient
care in the United States.

This bill further seeks to override the Americans with Disabilities Act and
the Health Information Privacy Act by allowing the West Virginia State
Police, local and federal law enforcement agencies, and drug task forces
(whatever they might be), to invade patients' treatment records without
subpoena or other due process -- basic constitutional protections that
should not go out the window when someone seeks medical care.

I am told that Health and Human Resources is already considering some local
regulations that will complement maintenance treatment here by making it
uniquely ours.

We support reasonable measures that provide quality care in methadone
maintenance treatment, and we support allowing competing private clinics
into our state so competition in our relatively closed markets can raise
quality of care at lower prices.

But this bill is a throwback to the days of paranoia and misinformation,
when people who needed help were in fear of asking.

We urge West Virginians to tell their legislators NO on House Bill 4387.

Please visit our Web site for further information on the advocacy project
and maintenance treatment in general: http://home.earthlink.net/~wvmap or
email us at wvmap@earthlink.net .

Dann White

Charleston