Ira Levy’s guest commentary which appeared in Friday's op-ed pages of the Courier News is a shocker. It presents a sobering analysis of the difficulty in dealing with drug abuse in New Jersey.
Levy should know. As a self-acknowledged, former drug addict and now a detoxification expert at Sunrise Detox, he discusses the harrowing reality of dealing with the depth and breadth of heroin drug abuse in this state. “We have some of the purest street heroin in the nation,” he says, underscoring that young people in New Jersey between 18 and 25 are addicted to this narcotic at “more than twice the national average.”
What is just as jolting is Levy’s claim that Suboxone, a synthetic narcotic designed for the treatment of heroin abuse, may itself cause addiction, if used continually as a maintenance curative. At the end of his essay, Levy questions the long term risk of “Suboxone maintenance programs” as merely “switching seats on the Titanic.”
I can’t adequately convey in these few words the personal and societal costs which we all bear in New Jersey, because of drug abuse. No one can, except perhaps those who have lived through what must be the horror of heroin addiction.
Levy’s article can be found on page A12 in the Friday, February 19, 2010 print edition of the Courier News. It is powerful and probably controversial. Nonetheless, it’s well worth reading the full text to understand the issues which he describes in treating drug abuse.
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