NYC Uses Taxpayer Funds for 'How to Shoot Heroin' Pamphlet
Is this the epitome of tax dollar waste or an attempt to stop the dangerous sharing of needles? New York City spent $32,000 to produce and distribute pamphlets that explain the best way to shoot heroin. Anti-drug officials are outraged, while the Health Department is defending its actions.
"It's basically step-by-step instruction on how to inject a poison," John Gilbride, who heads the Drug Enforcement Administration's New York office, told the New York Post.
The city distributed 70,000 copies of the 16-page guidebook, called "Take Charge, Take Care" to addicts and people at risk of becoming heroin users. It gives detailed instructions of how to prepare the drug, and how to shoot it. Tips include:
-- Warm your body (jump up and down) to show your veins.
-- Find the vein before you try to inject. Tie off to make your veins visible.
-- Don't "dig" for veins. If you don't "register," pull out and try again.
"It concerns me that the city would produce a how-to on using drugs," Gilbride said. "Heroin is extremely potent. You may only get the chance to use it once. To suggest there is a method of using that alleviates the dangers, that's very disturbing."
But the Health Department says the pamphlet is not simply a how-to guide. It says it stresses the importance of kicking the habit, seeking professional help and not sharing needles.
"Our goal is to promote health and save lives with this information," said Daliah Heller, assistant commissioner for the Bureau of Alcohol and Drug Use Prevention, Care and Treatment.
Asked why the handout tells people how to shoot up, Heller said, "From a health perspective, there is a less harmful way to inject yourself."
But New York City drug czar Bridget Brennan says while it does have some useful information, the pamphlet still sends the wrong message.
"What we do not want to do is suggest that there's anything safe about shooting up narcotics," said Brennan. "No matter how many times you wash your hands or how clean the needle is, it's still poison that you're putting in your veins."
Peter Vallone, Jr., who chairs the City Council's public safety committee, vowed to shut down the distribution of the pamphlet.
"This is a tremendous misuse of city funds, and I'm going to see what I can do to stop it. It sends a message to our youth: give it a try," he fumed.
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As a clean addict who has now been in NA for 5 years I don't think this is as terrible ass it seems. I think only saying don't use drugs is like teaching kids to just not have sex and not about safe sex. As much as I would like for no one to have to go through what I did I know that people will continue to pick up for their first time or for their 1,000. Have a good friend who got clean a year before me who has HIV from sharing needles and I my self lost a toe and almost my whole foot from not knowing that it was dangerous to dig for veins. I would say the only really problem with this pamphlet for me is who can get their hands on it. Its the type of thing that should be on the wall at needle exchanges and methadone clinics not being handed out where someone who "just wants to try once" can get their hands on it. Its sad but allot of the kids i used to hang out with are now dead because they "just wanted to try it once" what really should be thought is their is no such thing as once. If you have that whole in you life where you want to get high your going to keep trying to fill it till you hits Jails, Institutions, or Death. I just hope that this will help some people who are where i was 5 years ago stay safe because those derelicts are someones someone child, mother, father, brother, or sister and most of them don't want to be mainlining poison into themselves everyday but are to afraid of what they have done to stop.
The reason drugs are so profitable is the prohibition. And as long as drugs can turn $100 into $1000,there will be people willing to take the chances and deal the drugs. And it isn't poor people buying those boatloads of cocaine or heroin or marijuana ,but only the poor go to prison for it. You hardly ever hear of a "big" dealer going to prison or even getting busted.
The FBI caught 5 "terrorists" trying to launder $100,000.oo recently but they can't catch the Mexican cartels laundering billions,year after year.
Maybe my information is directional,but it isn't false.
The National Institute for Drug Abuse has searched for the " smoking gun" and spent millions of dollars on studies trying to find harm in marijuana,every since they were created,for the war on drugs and the best they can come up with are anecdotal results
such as "Possible links with" or "could result in".never a clear and present danger for marijuana. And the only way they can find any harm is to use condensed isolated chemical compounds found in marijuana and subjecting their test animals with massive amounts of their synthesized compounds,more than any person or animal could possibly ingest or smoke of real marijuana.
This is in response for anyone trying to say marijuana is a dangerous drug.
Heroin is a terrible drug and it kills many, many people. Sadly, many of these people started out normal long ago, but once they traveled down the path of self destruction there was no looking back. Frankly, our society wastes too much time and money trying to help these derelicts. They chose to destroy their lives, should we really be funding clinics and pamphlets that only promote their debauchery? Heroin addiction simply leads to death-- isn't that what these people are honestly seeking with their drug habits?
The quicker these people OD, the quicker they are off the public medicare, public housing , welfare, etc. etc. I am not advocating their murder , but you have to look at the bigger picture. And the immense tax expense to coddle these folks. They are also spreading diseases, like AIDS . I just wish people would take responsibility for their own actions. Throw them in jail, not rehab. Cordon them off in one part of town and take them and the dealers out of the good neighborhoods. Keep them away from the next generation, that would be a fantastic idea.
Bloomberg has never been a sincere Republican and this sort of thing happening under his very nose is an indication of that. I think society has gone too far in embracing drug culture, we see it glorified on tv every night and nearly every celebrity out there seems to "wink wink" make the lifestyle seem dangerous and glamorous.
There has never been a drug free society and never will be,no matter how many people you lock up or even kill. Man,and animals like to get high. Outlawing pleasure is an exercise in futility.
All you will accomplish is spending money .
Our government still hasn't learned that,or maybe they have.
The DEA allowed the 2009 opium crop to be sold on the black market to avoid alienating the Afghanistan farmers,because it is their only source of income . They could have bought the whole crop and napalmed it,stopping 80% of the worlds opium(heroin)production and those farmers wouldn't have cared where the money came from.
It would have made sure no one was hurt by that crop or any terrorist used it too finance their attacks.
That is why countries all over the world are withdrawing support for the war on drugs . When the country that rammed the drug war down
the UN's throat allowed drugs to be sold,it spoke louder than all their propaganda and lies. And the other countries recognize a scam when it is run on them.
We,the people are mere pawns to the bankers and industrial giants that run this country.
The drugs that are legal and illegal are that way because they make money off of them and has nothing to do with protecting or saving anyone,except the continuation of the bankers and big industry making money.
Wow, what conspiracy theory website did you download that pamphlet propaganda from? Heroin = pleasure? The DEA promoting drugs ? People are the pawns of our local bankers? Friend, please snap out of your 1960s flashback. Your theories are outdated and ridiculous. No one with any common sense could believe such insanity.
Heroin does bring on a pleasurable sensation,even the anti drug pamphlets you read say that. And the opium crop was allowed to be sold by the US in 2009,when we had control of the "Happy Valley"
as it is called. So if that is a conspiracy,whose conspiracy theory is it?
You need to open your eyes and tune out the anti-drug propaganda long enough to figure out that all those billions of dollars the cartels in Mexico are not being carried across our borders in suitcases.
The UN drug czar has stated that the only reason most of the major banks ,all over the world didn't fail during this economic upheaval is because of the laundering and flow of "drug" money .
You can't even transfer $10,000 in our banking system without triggering alarms in several watchdog organizations,including the federal reserve.
With today's technology and the organizations checking for just such transactions,how do you think those billions of dollars keep getting to Mexico,year after year?
The web site: opensecrets.com will let you check just how much money they pay our legislators to vote for their interests.
And your legislators do vote according to who pays the most. The health reform should tell you that. Every poll before the Christmas
Eve vote said that the American public did not support the health reform movement,yet,we are getting it anyway,regardless of the majorities opinion.
I have researched them,and every senator or representative that opposes drug law reform receives hundreds of thousands from the financial industry and the pharmaceutical industries,while the legislators that support drug law reform receive $0 from the same industries.
While this is not 100% proof of conspiracy,it is hard to say that it isn't. Maybe you can figure out some other reason for the differences in funding,but there is a distinct line drawn there.
Opensecrets.org,not .com. It is a lobby funding watch group,not a conspiracy site.
I'm an investigative journalist and I am entirely familiar with your types of radical disinformation. I am sorry but your sources are not credible and your bias is plainly crazily left wing. As a credentialed news reporter, I believe anyone who promotes drugs use as you do is committing a crime . You are committing a crime against the youngest and most precious of American children , the next generation which could lead this country to strength and greatness on a global scale. Instead, drug pushers are putting this country's very future, and the future of the world at risk as I have seen as a professional journalist many times. You're doing all of this for a short lived pleasure high from an illegal street drug. It's awfully sad.
Anyone that supports the prohibition of drugs and continuing the war on drugs is endangering the American children . Continuation of the prohibition continues drugs being sold by dealers that don't check ID's
and don't care who they sell too. Legalization means licensed retail points that check ID's and the reduction of availability of drugs to children.
Continuing to put non-violent,victimless criminals in prison for possessing a weed that grows anywhere and has been used,safely
by mankind for centuries,as food , medicine and recreation is a crime against humanity.
You have mistakenly misinterpreted my goal.I don't want marijuana
mandatory,I want marijuana legal . The other drugs that are prohibited I could actually care less,but too continue prohibiting them makes them available to children for the same reasons,dealers don't check ID's,and they "cut " those drugs with dangerous substances that cause the majority of the health problems we are fighting with drug abuse. Having them manufactured by reputable companies and sold through retail points stops those problems.
Our country has spent over one trillion dollars fighting the war on drugs and there are more drugs available than ever. Our prisons are so full of drug offenders that the county jails are full of convicted prisoners awaiting an empty bed in the prison to go. Our court systems are log jammed with drug charges awaiting trial..
And you want to continue doing the same thing,the same way.
They can't even stop drugs in their own prison system.
Now,who is the fool?