We Need to Change The Strategy to Win The War - Joe Almeida

We Need to Change The Strategy to Win The War - Joe Almeida

I served on the Providence police force for 16 years. In that time, I saw many bad things. I watched my beloved city slowly and steadily has become awash in guns. I watched crime in neighborhoods get more rampant and random, and I had a front-row seat to our war on drugs. Its tactics the same. Find drug addled addicts, lock them up, send them either back to the streets or to prison and stigmatize them for life; whether in their pursuit to recovery, employment, housing, credit or a seat at the family Thanksgiving table.

Lately, opioids and other drugs bought on the streets have been laced with fentanyl causing overdose and death at an alarming rate. In Rhode Island alone, there were 240 fatalities in 2014, according to the Rhode Island Department of Health. By last year that number almost doubled to 435, with Providence accounting for 94 of those fatalities.

In March, thanks to legislation introduced by Representative John Edwards and Senator Joshua Miller, Rhode Island became the first state in the nation to sanction harm reduction centers, otherwise known as overdose prevention sites, where people suffering from substance abuse disorder can get behavioral and physical healthcare. According to New England Psychologist, “These facilities will provide health screening, disease prevention, and recovery assistance in which pre-obtained substances can be safely consumed.”

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It will also cut down on street crimes, petty theft, and home invasions.

We need haste without delay in setting up these two pilot programs.

Too many times as an officer on the beat, I answered the call to a possible overdose victim and in one instance, held a friend as he died in my arms.

I have gone to too many funerals. We need to treat patients suffering from substance abuse disorder for who they are; our brothers and sisters, mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, nieces, nephews, cousins, neighbors and friends.

We also need more behavioral and substance disorder health care professionals to work with the police and take more of the burden to keep our fellow citizens alive.

The War on Drugs has failed for the past 50 years, but we can still win, by changing tactics and renewing our goals of preventing crime and saving lives.

 

Joe Almeida formerly served in Rhode Island House of Representatives District 12, and is now a candidate for R.I. Senate, District 6