TreatmentTalk – How can Drug Addiction Be Made More Important to the President?

I just received this email today from CASA, The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University. The website is http://chairmanscorner.casacolumbia.org.

“In his latest Chairman’s Corner, CASA^* Founder and Chairman Joseph A. Califano, Jr. talks about how many children and families and how many tax dollars would be saved if the President, the governors and the media paid as much attention to our nation’s addiction to drugs as they do to our addiction to oil.”

Mr. Califano supports the efforts in the Gulf on Mexico to contain the oil spill and acknowledges the devastation that the spill has caused in that area, but discusses the idea that if the government would put the same energy towards our nation’s drug problem, how different the outlook might be, as well as money saved to the taxpayers. This is just one more problem handed to President Obama, but it should be a priority. When I think of the money spent on welfare and prisons alone, I’m sure the amount must be staggering, not to mention medical bills and everything else that goes along with paying the cost of addiction in America. The following quote is from the newsletter with statistics that should concern us all.

“In pressing for his energy bill, President Obama has noted that we Americans are five percent of the world’s population, but we consume 25 percent of the world’s oil.

What about this one, Mr. President: We Americans are five percent of the world’s population and we consume 66 percent of the world’s illegal drugs. This other American addiction ruins millions of individuals and families each year.”

The question is, besides writing to the people in office, what can we do?