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[quote=Anonymous]PP is drawing the wrong parallel for the crack epidemic.  It's not the heroin epidemic, but the meth epidemic of the nineties.

Like crack, meth has no known medical use.  Crack was mostly an urban AA underclass phenomenon, while meth was mostly a rural white underclass one.  Meth manufacturers, dealers, and users were dealt with harshly by police and the legal system and no one has any sympathy for them.

The trade in both was accompanied by violence, and most deaths associated with the drugs were over turf battles for which police were the first responders.  Because crack is more urban, the trade wars were more concentrated, while that accompanying meth was more scattered and diffuse across the vast heartland and, thus, less visible in the media.

For the most part no one dies from a crack or meth overdose.  Rather, both can have devastating health effects as they are used over years.

In contrast, opiates have medical uses, and a very large percentage of heroin users started out with prescription opiates.  The point of taking them was not, unlike crack or meth, to get high but to alleviate physical pain, at least as an initial matter. However, like meth, the population most affected is the rural white underclass.

The current heroin epidemic has not been accompanied by violent drug trade wars--the distributors probably having learned that's a bad policy based on the harsh legal responses to the crack and meth trades. So the vast majority of heroin associated deaths is among users, not distributors, unlike the case for the other two drugs.  It is very easy to overdose on heroin or prescription opiates, so the first responders to a heroin-related death tend to be medical personnel, and not police.

There are medical treatments for both heroin overdoses and addictions, so it is not surprising that doctors who are dedicated to saving lives are vocal in making these more available.  There are no direct actions doctors can take to stem deaths from drug turf battles.

For this reason, the ones leading the way on responding to heroin are public health officials and not law enforcement. The difference we are seeing in response to the heroin epidemic vs. the crack and meth epidemics is in large part owing to this difference.[/quote]

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