The Trib is to be commended for its front-page coverage of the heroin epidemic that is causing untold suffering to thousands of families in Pennsylvania ("Heroin hits home," by Carl Prine, Feb. 9.) Also, columnist Mike Seate, an exceptional journalist, has written about open-air drug-dealing on the North Side to no avail; it continues.

With home invasions on the rise, with bank robberies, shootings, murders a nightly occurrence, it is clear the motive is drugs. Our homeland security is under attack by the drug cartels.

The DEA has a budget of $15.6 billion to fight the war on drugs; we have lost the war.

Kathleen Burke, Carnegie

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