There are some newer treatments of drug addiction (e.g. wrt. opioids) that seem to hit a useful middle ground. They do more than simply letting the addict hit "rock bottom", e.g. they do mitigate the effects of physical dependence and withdrawal - but they seemingly do not replicate the "rewarding" and "addictive" effects of the drug. They're still rather controversial, precisely because nobody wants to inadvertently "enable" an opioid junkie in their destructive habit, but their use may be worthwhile here.
>who typically do not want their neighborhood filled with addicts who have moved in to get free services, free needles, and safe spaces.
The lack of a policy for dealing with homeless addicts is a effectively just a policy of keeping them in the poorest neighborhoods. Ignoring them doesn't make them go away, we can do better.
I'd imagine if there was free heroin and needles inside, not many people would continue buying H and discarding syringes on the street.
One idea I've heard of is requiring more needles to be handed in before fresh needles are handed out as a means of incentivizing neighborhood cleanup.
No, becoming a drug addict will keep you in poorest neighborhoods. This is simple cause and effect. And why should drug addicts not live in poor neighborhoods? Why would you move the drug addicts out of poor neighborhoods, but not the non-addicts? You are suggesting policy that incentivizes addiction.
> This has not been attempted anywhere. What are you referring to?
If you don't live in San Francisco, I'd recommend checking out this recent video:
https://www.cnn.com/videos/us/2018/12/14/san-francisco-opioi...
There are certain blocks of the city in the Tenderloin and SoMa where people are free to shoot up heroin in broad daylight. The city hands out 400,000 free needles to junkies every month. We spend $300 million a year on homeless programs with little oversight or accountability, and recently voted to double that to $600M+. And now they're proposing official safe injection sites in the middle of the city. Is this putting a dent in the addiction problem? No, the city is becoming a dystopian hellscape.
Concentrate the people creating the 'dystopian hellscape' so services can be provided to them more efficiently and cheaply. If they can't get clean, they can stay inside and get a daily lecture on why they should be sober before their fix.
I'm not saying that its "fair" that everyone else pays for this. I'm saying we're already paying more than this and it isn't working, so puritan notions that "Govt should never provide people with certain drugs" should be challenged if there is a strong economic benefit.
> Perhaps it's not surprising that when you work to make addicts happier, you attract more addicts.
> Common knowledge used to be that an addict needs to hit "rock bottom" before they will turn their life around.
Please cite your claims.
This is the current trend in many progressive cities, and so far it's a massive failure. Perhaps it's not surprising that when you work to make addicts happier, you attract more addicts. You also wind up with an entire industry that spends hundreds of millions of tax dollars catering to the addicts, and which perversely needs addicts to remain addicted in order for the industry to survive. The situation only gets worse.
These policies put the addict's needs above those of the non-addicts, since most non-addicts do not want a neighborhood filled with junkies who moved in to get free services, free needles, and legal injection sites.
Common knowledge used to be that an addict needs to hit "rock bottom" before they will turn their life around. If this is true, by making addicts happier and more comfortable, you're not helping anybody.