Pubdate: Thu, 16 Mar 2006
Source: Eagle-Tribune, The (MA)
Copyright: 2006 The Eagle-Tribune
Contact:  http://www.eagletribune.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/129
Author: Robert  Sharpe, Policy analyst, Common Sense for Drug Policy, 
Washington
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/heroin.htm (Heroin)

CONTROLLED HEROIN USE IS A BETTER SOLUTION

To the editor:

Regarding your Feb. 26 editorial on the opiate scourge: Switzerland's 
heroin maintenance trials have been shown to reduce drug-related 
disease, death and crime among chronic users.

Addicts would not be sharing needles if not for zero tolerance laws 
that restrict access to clean syringes, nor would they be committing 
crimes if not for artificially inflated black market prices.

Providing chronic addicts with standardized doses in a clinical 
setting eliminates many of the problems associated with heroin use.

Heroin maintenance pilot projects are underway in Canada, Germany, 
Spain and the Netherlands. If expanded, prescription maintenance 
would deprive organized  crime of a core client base. This would 
render illegal heroin trafficking unprofitable and spare future 
generations addiction. Putting public health before politics may send 
the wrong message to children, but I like to think the children are 
more important than the  message.
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MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman