Responses to this will be interesting to watch. I’m certain that people who object will be accused of moral panic or something like it.

Today’s UK papers have advocates and critics of heroin maintenance, but is anyone looking out for the addicts themselves? Where are the op-eds calling for an audacious recovery-oriented treatment initiative?

Mark Kleiman makes an important point about the heroin maintenance study released last week and the flaws in the coverage of the study. (Previous post here.)

John Tierney cites NYT reporter Benedict Carey for the claim that ” treating hard-core heroin addicts with their drug of choice seems to work better than treating them with methadone.” But neither Carey nor the paper Carey reports on makes any such claim. The study wasn’t among “hard-core heroin addicts” generally, but among addicts who had already failed on methadone treatment.

I’ve devoted a lot of posts to this issue. In spite of what’s been suggested in comments, I’m not…

Heroin better for addicts in recovery. Really? Recovery? Really?

Here’s the abstract.

Raises some interesting questions about the future of the word recovery.

There’s been discussion in recent years about being more inclusive with concept of recovery to make room for medication-assisted recovery, serial recovery, partial recovery, 12-step, faith based, secular, solo, etc. To be sure, many had defined it too narrowly. But, at what point does it lose its meaning? Could we get to the point where people using their drug of choice under medical supervision are considered to be in recovery? Is this headline an indication that it is already losing its…

The New York Times follows heroin’s trail in Ohio:

Paul Coleman, the director of Maryhaven, the largest rehabilitation center in the region, said the percentage of patients reporting opiates, principally heroin, as their preferred drug — whether it is smoked, inhaled or injected — grew to 68 percent last year from 38 percent in 2002.
. . .
In Ohio, for instance, heroin-related deaths spread into 18 new counties from 2004 to 2007, the latest year for which statistics are available. Their numbers rose to 546 in that period, from 376 for 2000 to 2003.
. . .
The share of heroin-related prosecutions among federal drug…

by William Cope Meyers

In the throes of a crisis, a family would do anything to halt the destruction caused by a loved one’s inability to stop drinking or taking drugs. But what about calling the police?

Dear Mr. Moyers: Our daughter is a college graduate with a good head on her shoulders and a loving, caring heart. About seven months ago, Jean was treated for a heroin problem for the first time. The day she got out of treatment, she went back to her dealer, an old boyfriend, and was high again in an hour. She lost everything, even custody of…

Is England considering adopting Denmark’s heroin maintenance approach?

Some might think this initiative is not surprising in a country with a historical tradition of progressive, social democratic policies….

“Five years ago I decided I would not participate in yet another debate on drugs,” recalls Preben Brandt, the chairman of the Council for Socially Marginalised People and an advocate of the policy. “It was too emotional, with different groups being very aggressive.”

“The counter-argument was always ‘you kill people by giving heroin’ or ‘with this initiative, you are telling people that taking heroin is OK’,” he says. “It is very difficult to have a rational…

This is why a trial in some far off place matters.

[hat tip: dailydose.net]

Since I started Suboxone treatment 15 months ago, I’ve had my Google Alerts set to track news and blog posts for mentions of Suboxone and Buprenorphine (the active ingredient in Suboxone). Many of the items alerted are news reports of drug busts, where the bustee was caught with some heroin or Oxycontin - and a few Suboxone pills as well. Other alerts are people posting on message boards looking for advice or support regarding the use of Suboxone. And then there are the Suboxone rants.

Usually I just pass up these angry blog posts. Today however I allowed myself to be…

The heroin/methadone death match continues. Pretty troubling, of accurate.

Remember, DeVlaming is a methadone advocate. I like his use of quotation marks around the word treatment in reference to the heroin maintenance approach.

I found this quote from Reviving Ophelia, and it was such a perfect description of the descent into codependence that I had to share it with you all:

“The story of Ophelia, from Shakespeare’s Hamlet, shows the destructive forces that affect young women. As a girl, Ophelia is happy and free, but with adolescence she loses herself. When she falls in love with Hamlet, she lives only for his approval. She has no inner direction; rather she struggles to meet the demands of Hamlet and her father. Her value is determined utterly by their approval. Ophelia is torn apart by her…

I’m ready to bet one hundred million dollars that my husband will be using again within 48 hours. He is boiling addict behavior all over the place. In a 5-minute phone conversation, he demanded that we let go of all the boundaries I’ve set (Let me use the car. I’m going away soon, just let me use it one time. I don’t feel like working today. Why don’t you call out for me and say that I have to go home to meet the repairman or something? I feel like lying on the couch and thinking about things. I don’t…