INVESTING IN TREATMENT

HEROIN IS a particularly destructive narcotic because it kills through
overdoses and through diseases like AIDS and hepatitis C that the addicted
contract and then transmit by using contaminated needles. Paying to
maintain a heroin habit drives many addicts to commit crimes. Relatively
high purity and low price have made this drug more popular than ever.
According to the Bureau of Substance Abuse Services of the State Department
of Public Health, 42 percent of individuals entering state substance abuse
programs in 2002 reported using heroin, versus just 19 percent in 1992.
Deaths by overdose of heroin and similar drugs like morphine and oxycodone
rose by 156 percent between 1990 and 1998 and by 10 percent between 1999
and 2000. Outside of the four Massachusetts communities that have
needle-exchange programs, intravenous drug use and sexual contact with IV
drug users are the most common modes of transmitting AIDS.

Yet in spite of data like these, the state House of Representatives has
stricken from its budget all funding for heroin-treatment programs that use
methadone. The Senate should reinstate the $52 million that these services
cost.

Regular doses of methadone, a synthetic drug, keep addicts from
experiencing the euphoric rush of heroin and also eliminate the withdrawal
and craving that drive many addicts back to heroin when they try to break
their addiction without methadone. In study after study, methadone has been
found to reduce illegal drug use and crime rates while making it possible
for users to hold down a job.

Despite this proven record, some critics say methadone replaces one
addiction with another. The difference, however, is that heroin is a
destabilizing drug that destroys families and careers, while methadone has
no mood-altering effects on addicts and stabilizes their central nervous
system. Critics also fault methadone for its long treatment periods, but
that is true as well of long-term treatment of heart disease, diabetes, or
any other chronic disease.

A benefit of methadone treatment that is too often neglected by its critics
is the counseling and education that accompany it. Treatment programs
provide the state's 12,000 methadone users a chance to address the effects
that addiction to heroin has on their lives and to work toward getting
along without abusing substances of any kind. Counseling and tests for for
both HIV and hepatitis C are also offered.

The average cost of methadone treatment in this state is $4,500 per client
annually, with the federal government picking up half the cost of clients
served through Medicaid. It is a sound and humane investment in public
health and public safety.