Churches Need to Make Heroin Epidemic a Priority

To The Editor:
I read your recent article regarding the heroin epidemic. This epidemic started at least 20 years ago. I am glad that it has finally reached the eye of the public. I compare it to the stages of cancer. If there is a fifth stage cancer, that is the stage we are in with alcohol and drugs.
There are numerous stories of people young and old who have died from drug and alcohol addiction in our county. It is next to impossible to get any statistics on this, and if we could and it was advertised, maybe we would get a true picture of what we are really looking at. It is going to take much more than meetings and drug arrests to stop this epidemic. It has become entrenched in our county.
Remember that along with drug and alcohol deaths, come diseases such as hepatitis and AIDS. AIDS is in our county among the young, and I have been told that when they find out they have it, they really don’t understand. We need to start open-door policies at drug clinics that have open-door access to rehab centers. We need to spread the money given to Cape May County out where it can do the most good.
Right now I believe most of it, or it could be all of it, goes to Cape Counseling and I know many people who have gone begging and pleaded for help to a rehab center. We need to open our eyes to what is truly happening here. Anyone who knows me knows that I have tried and tried to wake people up to this horrific situation and much of it has fallen on deaf ears.
I am getting too old to do much else than write letters and pray that Cape May County is finally waking up to this very sad situation. We have senior centers in almost every district for seniors to get free lunches and play their games. It is about time that we stop wasting our youth. We are too focused on denial for the sake of tourism and that, as you can see, is a dead end street.
When I say pray, I am in earnest. Every church in Cape May County should make this a top priority. We need to save our youth for a change. It is long overdue.
MARY K. SNYDER
Cape May