That psychedelic drugs, such as LSD and MDMA (ecstasy), can be effective treatments for various psychiatric illnesses is an old idea. Once considered wonder drugs for their effects on anxiety, depression, alcoholism, and other mental illnesses, they have been effectively banished from medical practice after legal rulings banned their sale and use. Although such bans were largely put in place to quash concerns about rampant recreational drug use fuelling the counter cultures of the 1960s and 1980s (LSD and MDMA, respectively), criminalisation of these agents has also led to an excessively cautious approach to further research into their therapeutic benefits. [continues 226 words]
Luz Espinosa is not the sort of woman who figures large in the calculations of Trenton politicians. She's lived most of her adult life as a prostitute in Newark, addicted to heroin, sleeping in abandoned buildings and vacant lots. She has AIDS, and it's almost killed her over and over. There aren't many votes to be had in her demographic group. But it would be nice if the politicians in Trenton invited her to testify someday. Then they might realize how much damage they are doing by re fusing to allow addicts in New Jersey to get clean needles. The political stalemate over this issue has deadly consequences. [continues 565 words]
The link been methamphetamine's infiltration within the gay community and increased HIV infections among us is a key cause for the growing concern about this problem. Yet this troubling linkage is the direct result of gay men using the drug to enhance sexual encounters and lessen the difficulties many face in managing self-esteem issues as they try to fuck and make connections with other gay men. Among gay men who use meth, there is a subset who choose to administer the drug intravenously. These injection drug users are known as slammers and they slam meth as opposed to snorting, smoking, or "booty bumping," the practice of inserting it into the rectum where it is absorbed by the porous mucosal lining. [continues 992 words]
The Needle Exchange Program Must Conform To Legal Requirements In response to the Post-Gazette editorial "Pointless Criticism: The County's Needle Exchange Program Works: (April 4). It is a bit puzzling that after three weeks of thought the Post-Gazette editorial board would miss the main point of the needle exchange program inquiry. The bottom line is that the way the program evolved and is operating may not be in the best manner and I believe may not be set up legally. This is something an elected official ought not to ignore. [continues 575 words]
Long after the gavel has fallen, the handcuffs have been clamped and the jail door slammed shut, people who've committed crimes in Bucks County are still hearing from the courts. The message: Pay up! Thanks to an upgraded computer system, former defendants who have fallen behind in paying -- or have flat out ignored -- their court costs bills are now finding lawsuits on their doorsteps. In the past two months hundreds have been filed in cases where the person owes more than $1,000. [continues 599 words]
Recent doubts have emerged about the utility and efficacy of Pittsburgh's privately funded needle exchange program, Prevention Point Pittsburgh ("Pointed Debate," April 3). The program provides injection drug users with sterile injection equipment, along with referrals to drug treatment programs, access to health care and other social services, on-site counseling and testing for HIV and hepatitis C in an effort to markedly reduce the spread of the two diseases. Syringe exchange programs are better understood as public health policy. It is simply old-fashioned infectious disease control; to assume that there is not enough evidence to support the benefits of these programs is flatly wrong. Scientific, medical and legal bodies studying the issue have concluded that improved access to sterile syringes can be a practical and effective method to reduce the spread of HIV and hepatitis C. Overwhelming evidence and support from the scientific community have shown that needle exchange programs do not promote substance use. In fact, programs when linked to other services, as is the case with Prevention Point Pittsburgh, can even assist patients in breaking the cycle of substance use and save lives. [continues 78 words]
Dear Editor, As with the Fugitive Slave Act and the Volstead Act, the time has come again for juries to not convict, this time on "drug crime." Encouraging children to snitch on their parents; getting parents to drug test and rat on their children; harassing the sick and dying is despicable and against American ideals. Prohibition ruins young lives! It destroys families without compunction or compassion. When any drug's production and distribution is left to gangsters and cartels it triggers more danger to the user and society by increasing violent crime and corruption of public officials. [continues 433 words]
Can Regain Eligibility If They Complete Rehab WASHINGTON -- One in every 400 students applying for federal financial aid for college is rejected because of a drug conviction, an analysis of Department of Education numbers by a drug policy overhaul group found. A study to be released today by Students for Sensible Drug Policy says 189,065 people have been turned down for financial aid since the federal government added a drug conviction question to the financial aid form in the 2000-01 school year. [continues 356 words]
Here are some facts. They come from Statistics Canada. You can check them on the agency's website, if you don't believe them. Here they are. Violent crime dropped from 2001 to 2004. The homicide rate -- murders per thousand -- rose slightly (to 2.0 per 100,000 population in 2004 from 1.8 per 100,000 in 2000), but not so several other categories of crime. The attempted murder rate dropped during that period. Sexual assaults dropped. Other sexual offences dropped. Robbery rates dropped. Property crimes dropped, including break and entry and theft. (Motor vehicle thefts rose slightly.) Drug offences went up. [continues 581 words]
