Heroin Essay, Research Paper

The use of heroin has been a long-standing problem in society and nothing is going to change. Despite popular belief, it is here to stay. Since the strategy of heroin trials has been proposed it has brought out negative views suggesting that it is the wrong approach. Then what is the right approach? Continue twiddling or thumbs and crossing our fingers in the hope that the occasional heroin bust will do something more than put a scratch in the solid foundation that is the illicit drug trade? This will simply fail. Another approach must be taken which recognizes the needs of addicts who have been unable to quit their habit. We live in a drug taking society. If we could just accept this as a fact then we could begin to act accordingly.

In conjunction with current methods, heroin injecting rooms and distribution trials have the potential to considerably harm the street drug trade and crush the increasing drug-related death rate. These rooms would offer a clean environment and a healthier option for addicts rather than them having to shoot up in a back alleyway or some vile public toilet. Illicit drug use needs to be treated primarily as a health issue rather than a law enforcement issue. This is true, these people suffer from a disease, they need help and a supportive shoulder to lean on, not a jail cell. The zero tolerance scheme turns sick people into criminals, this is not the right way to address the problem. Australia spends over thirteen billion annually on alcohol and tobacco alone, both are potential death traps, both capable of addiction, both legal. Hypocrites. If we are willing to accept those in society with such vile habits, why are we not willing to help those heroin addicts in need? If there was another option they would take it. Many have tried drug alternatives, rehabilitation clinics, but eventually they go shamefully back to their addiction. There are over one-thousand chemists who will not even stock the heroin alternative, methadone, so what are the addicts suppose to do? It seems they are to wait until they are arrested and thrown into a jail cell, or die.

Appealing options. Alcohol and nicotine abuse in not shunned by the government, it makes a significant contribution to their income. Those suffering are not outcasts in the community due to their problem, so why heroin users? Maybe it is due to their effects. Alcohol can make one a blubbering idiotic mess. Cigarettes can lead to horrible cancers. Yet heroin users are regarded as a danger to society. Heroin trails are a viable choice. In saying this it does not mean, however, that other drug strategies should not still be used also. Options such as drug education in schools and street seizures should still be applied. However, these strategies alone are failing dismally. There is also a belief that heroin trails will condone the use of heroin as an acceptable past-time in the eye of the younger population. This is not true. Adolescents experiment and rebel- they have, do and will whether society likes it or

not. This does not mean heroin will increase. Teenagers find many ways to rebel, and the option of heroin trials will lessen the availability of the illegal substance as the street trade dies. Trials will discreetly bring the heroin users off the street and into a safe, controlled environment. Heroin addicts , if treated appropriately, could quite easily function in the community, sustain a relationship and even hold down a job. If we supplied registered heroin addicts with an appropriate amount of heroin free of charge then they are not threatened by financial problems due to their addiction. This places everyone in a more secure environment as there will be less drug related crime. It is time that someone stopped the unnecessary deaths just because we

turned a blind eye to the real problem. It is to much of a cost to the community in terms of crimes. Heroin trials will clean up the streets, and lower the numbers for crimes such as burglary. Then there is the addicts themselves. The heroin they are shooting up in a dirty gutter isn t well cut and is too pure, so it takes a life that could have been saved. The path that the heroin trade is heading down is only one of death and destruction if drastic measure are not taken. Over seventy lives have already been lost this year to overdose. That is seventy too many.