ADDICTION TREATMENT MUST BE AVAILABLE

Regarding the story, Teen's family awarded $150,000 (Dec. 21).

It's a sad state of affairs that a family has to bring legal action against
its provincial government to gain compensation for treatment that should
have been readily available. One could understand if this were a complex
medical procedure not yet available in Canada, but we are talking about
addiction services, of which there is a great deal of expertise in our
province.

The public and the government have not paid enough attention to this very
vital sector of our health-care system. It is not getting better. A
recently released major research report warned drug use among students is
on the rise. Without improvements, particularly for youth, more incidents
such as the one report in this article will occur.

On the positive side, this case and recent stories about the drinking
problem of Alberta Premier Ralph Klein are reported to be raising awareness
of addiction problems in our society.

Jeff Wilbee

Executive Director, Alcohol and Drug Recovery Association of Ontario