Outcry Over Jail's Plan to Cut Methadone Program

Jabberwocky

Jabberwocky

Frumious Bandersnatch
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7/1/13​

The Fix said:
An Albuquerque jail is attempting to get rid of its methadone program for addicted inmates, prompting concern among recovery advocates and the inmates who believe they will relapse without it, reports The New York Times. The Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC), New Mexico's largest jail, has been administering methadone for the last six years to the roughly 100 inmates enrolled at a methadone clinic prior to their arrests; methadone is also given to pregnant inmates with opiate addictions. The jail’s warden, Ramon Rustin, now says the program is too expensive to maintain; it currently costs Bernadillo County $10,000 a month and relies on $200,000 annually in state financing.

Rustin also claims there's little evidence of a drop in recidivism—one of the program’s main selling points. “My concern is that the courts and other authorities think that jail has become a treatment program, that it has become the community provider,” he says. “But jail is not the answer. Methadone programs belong in the community, not here.” Recovery advocates believe the high cost of methadone treatment is still much cheaper than the costs of incarcerating drug addicts. “Addiction needs to be treated like any other health issue,” says Maggie Hart Stebbins, a county commissioner who backs the program.

“If we can treat addiction at the jail to the point where they stay clean and don’t reoffend, that saves us the cost of reincarcerating that person.” Due to a lack of hard data about the correlation between methadone treatment and successful recovery, the Bernalillo County Commission has ordered Rustin to extend the program for another two months until its results can be studied further. The MDC is one of just a handful of prisons in the country to offer methadone treatment, although previous studies have revealed similar programs to be a success in helping inmates stay clean.

A 2009 study in The Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment found that male inmates in Baltimore who were treated with methadone were more likely to be free of opioids and cocaine, as well as to continue their treatment in the community, compared to those who only received counseling. Inmates currently being treated with methadone at MDC believe that the program is saving their life. “It’s the only thing that allows me to live a normal life,” says Betty Jo Lopez, 59. “These nurses that give it to me, they’re like my guardian angels.”
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http://www.thefix.com/content/albuquerque-jail-wants-end-methadone-program91103
 
No nethadone in jails and prisons I've been in during my ordeals. But I know if you get involved in the H game in prison you are fucked. They drop this program and they are going to have another hundred inmates sucked into the most hardcore and dangerous part of prison. It's worth the 10k a month trust me, if you value a Human life as worth more than $100. Bad bad bad move. And if they are getting 20k, what happens to the other 8k. "administrative costs"? Anybody making these kinds of decisions has to have some first hand experience, or talk to someone legit who can tell them how it is in there. Fuck man. Bad move. This prison is gonna be wishing they paid that 10k out of their own pockets for the trouble and down the line shit this will produce. maybe a couple will get sober. But most will get sucked into the machine. The drug trade is fucked in there!!
 
amanitadine said:
No nethadone in jails and prisons I've been in during my ordeals. But I know if you get involved in the H game in prison you are fucked. They drop this program and they are going to have another hundred inmates sucked into the most hardcore and dangerous part of prison. It's worth the 10k a month trust me, if you value a Human life as worth more than $100. Bad bad bad move. And if they are getting 20k, what happens to the other 8k. "administrative costs"? Anybody making these kinds of decisions has to have some first hand experience, or talk to someone legit who can tell them how it is in there. Fuck man. Bad move. This prison is gonna be wishing they paid that 10k out of their own pockets for the trouble and down the line shit this will produce. maybe a couple will get sober. But most will get sucked into the machine. The drug trade is fucked in there!!
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^ have you ever thought that the people who run jails might also be selling heroin to the inmates, and by ending the methadone maintenance, they would be raking in even more money from people and not having to pay for people's habits? Even though, methadone maintenance is more of ORT than a habit.
 
No nethadone in jails and prisons I've been in during my ordeals.
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This is my experience also. I know they have a methadone program at Rikers Island, I'm not sure if it is available at every facility in the New York.

Everytime I got locked up required an ugly cold turkey. Even when I had a script for benzos the jail psych (who I didnt see for 10 days) deemed I didn't need them. kicking opiates and benzos in jail is a hassle to say the least.

I'd wager the vast majority of correctional facilities in the US don't offer any type of ORT. I've never been locked up in the northeast though, if ORT in jail is widely prevelent anywhere I bet it is the NE.
 
Captain.Heroin said:
^ have you ever thought that the people who run jails might also be selling heroin to the inmates, and by ending the methadone maintenance, they would be raking in even more money from people and not having to pay for people's habits? Even though, methadone maintenance is more of ORT than a habit.
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Have i ever thought? Shit ive seen it with my own eyes. States pens are so fucking corrupt. A dirty well used point re sharpened on match book strikers goes for 50-100 stamps, minimum. Yes stamps, like postal office style, as this is the primary currency and doesn't devalue. Yes,other commissary items ebb and flowin terms of supply and demand. A "point " of cut heroin goes for around 1-200 stamp, depending if it the Latin kings, MS -13, the brothas, ornthe small chance that the peckerwoods are controlling things. People in laundry immensely have valuable jobs, and the cooks and food inventory lackeys mayhold the most power of all, outside of the gang leaders. Everybody wants extra food, and if you get a job runningnstocks and counts you can have a habit by trading alone. Hard to get positions obviously! The runners are happy to front one payment a few times. Then you are the gangs slave, either for simple shit like causing a distraction while someone, gets beat or plunged,mor being forced to confess to murders, rapes, etc that you had nothing to do with. They may have you attack a fresh fish , but any actual attacks that matter they save for the soldiers, and order you to just make it hard for the guards to get there. The list could go on and on. Moral: don't do drugs in jail unless you afford it, everyday. It all depends who you runnwith, if anyone. If you got family sending you shiploads in commissary you are gonna need friends or hired guards. Better yet, dont go to prisons!

And equally important, offer MMT, where it is already in place. These guys are gonna have trouble.
 
I'm surprised they ever supplied it in the first place, they much get so much pleasure from watching those dirty scoundrel criminal junkies squirming in pain for a couple weeks after intake.

If I ruled the country, I'd make it bupe, and make it a 6 month taper/maintenance time limit
 
ProfessorBananas said:
^ Wouldn't the bupe be more expensive than the methadone though?
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Bupe is substantially more expensive than methadone when purchasing in large quantities. But letting addicts writhe in pain while vomiting and shitting themselves in their cells is quite affordable.
 
Captain.Heroin said:
^ Probably isn't, methadone isn't cheap, especially when you pay for your doses at a clinic. It probably varies if you're buying it in industrial sized gallons though. ;)
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methadone is relatively cheap, it is expensive to us yes because if you pay 15 dollars a dose they are paying roughly a dollar for that dose...suboxone=expensive. in my state(mn)it varies by county but the only county that does methadone is my county which is hennipen, now at the hennipen county jail they now only give you a 3 day detox and never more than 90 so if you are on 110 like me it would be 90, 60, 30, nothing...pointless, i have been through it and it is good if you are only there for the night or two but for weeks...yer fucked. it used to be they would taper you for ten days but that got cut and i hear it will again soon be nothing. kicking in jail were the worst experiences of my life and the last one fucked me up in the head cuz i was kicking klonopin too! it was hell. inhumane, and the nursing staff were sadistic bastards who would say its 80 percent mental, what?
 
Man i feel bad for those people that are going to go w/o their doses. If its about money cant they just lower everyones dose, thus buying less methadone and spending less money. makes me think there are a lot of other reasons behind this.
 
^^ The Prison Industry investors are a greedy bunch, and they're looking for ways to "save" as much money as possible. They're cutting their losses, so to speak. At least that's how they probably see it. Ignorant troglodytes. Sure, go ahead an kick someone while they're already down on the ground face first and unable to get up without help.
 
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Awesome posts! Re: Capt'n, as far as I understand I was under the impression that methadone, in bulk, is really really cheap. Much more so than brand Suboxone (generic tex I really don't have much experience with). I mean, especially when compared to other "treatment" options while locked up, if the prison offer any to begin with (other than AA), would methadone be like the least expensive? Especially as someone else mentioned concerning how much heroin and habit related violence/disturbances/etc in house costs these institutions/companies, methadone would seem like it would end up costing the admin much less. Your thoughts?

Just to say, from personal experience, the courts, prisons, sentencing laws and justice services generally, are signficantly more "humane" than their American counterparts. I don't mean to say GB is ideal or perfect in this regard, it has more to do with how fucking bad the situation is in American courts, law enforcement, jails and prisons.
 
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