Pubdate: Sun, 17 Dec 2006
Source: Scotland On Sunday (UK)
Copyright: 2006 The Scotsman Publications Ltd.
Contact:  http://www.scotlandonsunday.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/405

NEW SOLUTIONS TO A LETHAL ADDICTION

THE murders of five women in Suffolk have exposed an underworld in 
which normal young women fall so deeply into heroin addiction that 
they will sell their bodies and risk their lives to buy the next fix. 
It is a world that most of us cannot begin to imagine, and yet it 
affects us all.

The common thread that joins the five victims, aside from their 
profession and their addiction, is the shock expressed by family and 
friends that each had fallen so far. Paula Clennell's father 
described "a sweet, gentle girl" who was commended at 16 for helping 
a pensioner who had fallen in the street; Gemma Adams' parents 
recalled a "bright and bubbly" Brownie; Anneli Alderton went off the 
rails at 17 when her computer programmer father Roy died of lung 
cancer; Annette Nicholls was an aspiring beautician but, her cousin 
said, "she got into heroin and it changed her almost overnight"; and 
the parents of Tania Nicol said "drugs took her away into her own 
secret world - a world that neither of us were aware of".

The theme is clear: the descent of these women was not preordained or 
made inevitable by being born into squalor and hopelessness; on the 
contrary, their early lives were full of hope and love. If such lives 
were destroyed by drugs, whose daughters - and sons - are safe?

There are other self-interested reasons why everyone must take the 
scourge of drugs seriously. In 2001, UKP333m raised from our taxes 
was spent on drug strategies in Scotland, a figure that rises each 
year as the authorities struggle to cope with the estimated 240,000 
heroin addicts in the UK. What's more, it has been estimated that 
these addicts each commit an average of 435 crimes a year, at a cost 
to society of UKP45,000.

This is why we all have a stake in tackling the country's drug 
problem - and we know that current solutions don't work. Methadone 
rescues just 3% of addicts and, despite countless education 
programmes, the toll of young users grows by the day.

The Scottish Executive's pledge, revealed here today, to try new 
measures is encouraging. More 'cold turkey' programmes and sending 
reformed addicts into schools may save a few lives here and there. 
The fear remains, however, that even more radical alternatives need 
to be considered. The 'tough love' proposals advocated by some drugs 
experts and gaining currency among Cabinet members need to be given 
serious consideration. Otherwise more lives will be lost like those 
of Tania, Gemma, Anneli, Annette and Paula - and the thousands of 
other addicts who die slower, less publicised deaths.
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MAP posted-by: Elaine