Pubdate: Mon, 14 Mar 2016
Source: New York Times (NY)
Copyright: 2016 The New York Times Company
Contact: http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/lettertoeditor.html
Website: http://www.nytimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/298
Author: Mark Eisenberg
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v16/n134/a06.html

WHAT TO DO ABOUT HEROIN ADDICTION

To the Editor:

Re "Use of Heroin in Public View Across the U.S." (front page, March 7):

Until they are ready for treatment and have access to it, people with 
an addiction to heroin will find a place to inject, whether it's in a 
fast-food restaurant bathroom, a church basement, a public bus or an 
abandoned building. Making restrooms inaccessible will only push the 
problem elsewhere.

Nurse-supervised safe injection sites like Insite in Vancouver, 
Canada, have been demonstrated to save lives and provide a pathway 
toward recovery. We need to follow suit.

MARK EISENBERG

Brookline, Mass.

The writer is a doctor of internal medicine at Massachusetts General 
Hospital and on the faculty of Harvard Medical School.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom