Pubdate: Sun, 10 Aug 2014
Source: Baltimore Sun (MD)
Copyright: 2014 The Baltimore Sun Company
Contact:  http://www.baltimoresun.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/37
Author: Robert G. Newman
Note: Dr. Robert G. Newman is the former president and CEO of Beth 
Israel Medical Center in New York. In the early 1970s he established 
and directed the two largest addiction treatment programs in the 
world: the New York City Health Department Methadone Maintenance and 
Ambulatory Detoxification Programs, which served over 33,000 patients 
annually.

ADDICTS NEED COMPASSION - AND TREATMENT

At a Drug Conference, Pope Francis Wrongly Derided Medication for Drug Abusers

On June 21, the Vatican press office published the presentation made 
by Pope Francis to the 31st International Drug Enforcement Conference 
(IDEC) in Rome. The pope told the conferees, "The problem of drug use 
is not solved with drugs! ... Substitute drugs are not an adequate 
therapy, but rather a veiled means of surrendering to the 
phenomenon." These comments represent an unfortunate, categorical 
rejection of "maintenance" treatment of opioid addiction with 
medications such as methadone.

In a secular field as complex and controversial as treating drug use 
and misuse, there inevitably is much about which people of good faith 
- - of all faiths - will disagree. There is, however, one point on 
which all should be united: Those who want and need medical care for 
their addiction, and who with tragic frequency are destined to die 
without it, must receive not only our compassion but also treatment 
known to save lives. Accordingly, one can only hope (and pray!) that 
His Holiness reconsiders his position.

Addiction - whether to drugs or alcohol - has long been recognized as 
a chronic medical condition, much like diabetes, hypertension and 
chronic pulmonary disease. These illnesses, and many more, have in 
common that to a large extent they are caused and/or exacerbated by 
behavior, such as patterns of eating and drinking, smoking and 
failure to exercise. Furthermore, by definition, chronic medical 
conditions cannot be "cured" even though - happily - most can be 
treated with very considerable success. This most definitely is the 
case with addiction to drugs.

As Pope Francis urged so compellingly, we indeed must "say 'yes' to 
life, 'yes' to love, 'yes' to others, 'yes' to education, 'yes' to 
great job opportunities." While not detracting in the slightest from 
this compassionate, affirmative declaration, the fact is that 
medication-based help also is essential for many. And for our 
opioid-dependent fellow human beings, there is no more effective - 
life-saving - treatment than maintenance with methadone or similar 
medications. To cite a 2004 joint statement of three key United 
Nations agencies, including the World Health Organization: 
"Substitution maintenance therapy ... can decrease the high cost of 
opioid dependence to individuals, their families and society at large 
by reducing heroin use, associated deaths, HIV risk behaviors and 
criminal activity."

Is it correct to label as "substitutes" medications utilized in the 
ongoing treatment of opioid dependence? Absolutely! They substitute 
help for abandonment. They substitute hope for despair. And for a 
great many - including the unborn - they substitute the prospect of a 
healthy life for a high risk of death.

Pope Francis noted in his remarks to the IDEC, "The Church ... does 
not abandon those who have fallen into the trap of drug addiction, 
but goes out to meet them with creative love." In many instances, 
however, creative love must be accompanied by effective medical 
treatment, and over the course of almost a half-century no treatment 
has proven more effective than maintenance in achieving the goal so 
eloquently expressed by the Pope: helping those afflicted "to 
rediscover their dignity and to revive those inner strengths, those 
personal talents, which drug use had buried but can never obliterate."

An emphatic papal endorsement of all forms of care, including very 
specifically maintenance treatment of addiction, would have an 
enormous impact throughout the world and lead to saving countless 
lives - literally as well as figuratively. This is an extraordinary 
opportunity, and one that Pope Francis should seize promptly and forcefully.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom