Pubdate: Mon, 24 Dec 2007
Source: Baltimore Sun (MD)
Copyright: 2007 The Baltimore Sun Company
Contact:  http://www.baltimoresun.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/37
Author: Dr. Yngvild Olsen

NO LIVES ARE RUINED BY BUPRENORPHINE

As a physician and public health professional who has dedicated my 
career to improving the lives of those with addiction to heroin and 
other opiates, I read with dismay The Sun's articles on buprenorphine 
("The 'bupe fix,'" Dec. 16-18). I have never seen a newspaper report 
so lacking in balance and context. Every medication has side effects; 
what's critical is the balance of risks and benefits.

Buprenorphine is an effective treatment for the dangerous disease of 
opiate addiction. Balanced against the benefit of saving thousands of 
lives is the small risk of diversion of the drug, which is a tiny 
slice of the overall illegal drug trade.

It is telling that despite months of reporting and thousands of 
words, The Sun did not find a single person in Baltimore whose life 
has been ruined by buprenorphine.

Yet just walk the streets in East or West Baltimore and you can find 
scores of people whose lives are being ravaged by the condition that 
buprenorphine treats effectively.

It would be a tragedy if The Sun's hysteria over the diversion of 
buprenorphine turned back the clock on the treatment of a devastating disease.

Dr. Yngvild Olsen Bel Air

The writer is the medical director of the Harford County Health 
Department and has done research on the medical use of buprenorphine.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom