Marijuana legalization
Jamie Comstock, health promotion program manager for the city of Bangor, recently gave a presentation for the jail diversion meeting in Bangor about how some of our age-old human behaviors of normalizing and socializing negative habits may turn out as yet another problem. She gave the example of how our attitude toward marijuana has changed from 1970 to 2014, and not for the better.
This move toward normalizing marijuana use is targeting children with edibles dressed like candy products, which are not safe.
I have met with people from the Medical Marijuana Association who graciously shared their stories about chronic conditions such as severe medical injuries such as back pain they were being prescribed opiates for that caused perpetuating conditions such as addictions. An introduction to medical marijuana led them to a better quality of life managing pain.
While there is a medical use that can provide a sense of quality of life, there are also trade-offs. THC is attracted to fat cells in the body, and neurons are as much as 90 percent fat. THC can build a plaque layer around neurons that eventually starts interfering with synapses’ transmissions causing early onset dementia, which is a big trade-off down the road.
But some people make that decision to have some sense of quality of life in the moment. But there are other things that can be done to improve quality of life, like exercise, massage, chiropractic, acupuncture and supplements, all of which are safer alternatives, which as a professional I will always encourage them to evolve to.
Carolyn B. Rae
Dixmont
Recidivism rate
Albert Einstein defined insanity as “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”
Now I’m not calling our judicial system insane, but our nation is facing a 76.9 percent recidivism rate for drug-related crimes, and our approach is becoming quite questionable.
Studies show that within five years of release, the same offenders are relapsing and committing crimes once again.
No solution comes from punishment without education. We must address the root of the problem to prevent it from occurring again. Simply giving these dependent criminals jail time is not working. It is acting more as a suspension than a correction from the crimes they have committed.
We, as a nation, cannot expect those from addiction to change their ways by simply telling them to stop, taking away their freedom, and offering basic room and board for a predetermined amount of time. With this approach, criminals re-entering society will be no better off than they were before.
The situations that these drug-dependent criminals find themselves in will not be prevented unless we can approach the root of the problem: We need to offer mental health and substance abuse treatment to those in need. Drug addiction must be seen as a medical condition rather than a crime.
Though most addicted criminals get themselves into these horrible situations, it is our duty, as fellow citizens, to get them out.
Nick Fournier
Bangor
Out of poverty
I am so glad to see that welfare reform is again on the table at the Legislature. Maine has been far too relaxed about welfare benefits for far too long. It hurts the taxpayer, it hurts the people who truly need the help and it hurts the state overall. There is no incentive for folks to better themselves and to get out of the system if we keep just handing out benefits.
Applying for three jobs, as this year’s welfare reform legislation again calls for, is not asking a lot. I would hope that folks who are able to have applied for work before they start thinking about applying for benefits. People should be encouraged to work and to move their way up the pay scale. The way you get a job is to apply for a job. People can’t move off of welfare unless they start at the beginning. The government should be enabling and promoting such steps, not a blanket acceptance of welfare as a way of life.
Thank you, Gov. Paul LePage and the Republicans in the Legislature for standing up for Mainers and encouraging folks to lift themselves out of poverty.
Sandra Blanchette
Orland
Minimum wage
For people who feel raising the minimum wage will make giant steps to eradicate poverty as we know it, this excerpt from a 2014 Forbes article may be of interest: “According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics there are about 3.6 million workers at or below the minimum wage (you can be below legally under certain conditions). That is 2.5 percent of all workers and 1.5 percent of the population of potential workers. Within that small group, 31 percent are teenagers and 55 percent are 25 years old or younger. That leaves only about 1.1 percent of all workers over 25 and 0.8 percent of all Americans over 25 earning the minimum wage.”
Fred Carey
St. George
Clinic progress
How is it that a state bureaucrat, doctor or otherwise, can dictate appropriate treatment for an opioid-dependent person? Some people are helped by Suboxone or Subutex but others are not and can only maintain a clean and sober life with methadone. Also, not many doctors want to be in the drug dependency business so they do not take the requisite training for prescribing Suboxone.
Patients struggling to be clean are at risk and risky to others who have the ability to give drugs. Working in methadone treatment in the early 1980s, it was known that such treatment was more for a community’s security since pharmacies and doctors offices were frequent targets of drug robberies. Later in the 1990s, the epidemic of AIDS from shared needles spawned new and bigger methadone programs.
And Maine wants to stop the progress those clinics made? Daily clinic visits monitor a patient’s progress while once-a-month doctor’s office visits do not. And testing for alcohol and other drugs isn’t routinely done at doctors’ offices.
Jane Fairchild
Orneville Township
Living wage
Adios, Mister Bagel. Another small-business owner whining about raising the minimum wage (April 15 in the Portland Phoenix and featured on the BDN website). Labor is a resource, not a commodity.
These business owners are likely the same individuals that offer 39 hours of employment in order to define positions as “part time” to avoid paying benefits. And as quick as they are to define what wage levels are appropriate, they never reveal what salary they draw or the business’s profit.
If a business owner can’t provide a living wage, he or she has no business being in business.
Peter Froehlich
Whitefield