EDUCATION SOLUTION TO DRUG ABUSE

The fact that the area's medical officer of health believes it will only be
a question of time before Lethbridge has its own methadone treatment clinic
should not come as a shock.

This city, like others of similar size, is not immune from the incursion of
"hard" drugs making the rounds throughout Canada.

Red Deer is having particular problems with heroin addiction and will soon
open what will be only the second methadone clinic in the province.
Methadone is a synthetic drug that is used to treat heroin and similar
additions. After having seen monthly needle exchange use quadruple in a
year to 8,000, the health region stepped in and contracted with a private
company to open a methadone clinic.

Lethbridge, too, has seen needle use go up. The Chinook Health Region now
supplies about 1,000 needles a month to addicts, up from 400. The health
regions supply addicts with needles to prevent multiple needle use, a
leading cause of HIV and hepatitis infections.

Four people recently were sickened in Lethbridge by using a designer drug,
GBL, which gives a quick high, similar to alcohol. But the substance can be
particularly dangerous, potentially fatal, if ingested with alcohol or
other drugs.

City police also say Oxycontin, a prescription drug known on the street as
Hillbilly Heroin, is also being illegally obtained and abused.

Then there's ongoing problems of the rave drug Ecstasy and abuse of
prescribed painkillers, cocaine and other drugs.

It seems if a drug, legal or otherwise, can be abused, it will be by someone.

Despite decades of trying, both in Canada and in the United States, all
efforts to choke off supplies of illegal drugs have proved ineffective. In
fact, British Columbia is well known for its illegal but thriving cottage
industry of growing and supplying high-quality marijuana. While enforcement
must continue and expand, it is not the solution to drug abuse.

Part of the answer is treatment and Alberta does have some quality
facilities. Unfortunately, it is not always easily accessible to those who
need it, particularly outside Calgary and Edmonton. Until its methadone
clinic opens, Red Deer residents with a heroin addiction who want treatment
will continue to have to pay their own way to a clinic in Edmonton . . .
and those with such addictions often do not have the means to do that.

The major part of the answer is education, heading off potential drug
problems before they start or at least nipping them in the bud. A number of
support groups and programs exist already in this city under the auspices
of AADAC and through schools with such programs as DARE. But much more
could and should be done to prevent drug addictions from getting started
and that is where attention and money ought to be focused.