Most every one seems to regard those suffering from this condition as being of a lower order of humanity, unwilling or too weak-minded to help themselves and fit subjects only for association with what is commonly known as the “underworld.” I wish to say that I myself have undergone a very complete revision of mind regarding these cases since the case of my brother has compelled me to investigate them. I have known my brother too well and for too many years to believe that he can possibly be placed in any such category.
I have made careful inquiries into the circumstances and origin of his addiction, and the results are absolutely convincing that the first administrations of the narcotic were to meet therapeutic indications and were continued without his knowledge or appreciation of its actions or ultimate results. I know that he has never experienced any pleasure from the narcotic, and I know that when the condition of addiction manifested itself he did not know what was the matter with him. He only knew that narcotic relieved intense suffering. I had never seen a case of addiction to my knowledge before I went to see him in response to the letter I received. The clinical symptomatology of withdrawal of an opiate was truly a revelation to me. That the condition from which these patients suffer is a distinct disease cannot be questioned by any intelligent observer.
I have found that the majority of patients who begin the use of opiates do so in search of relief from pain, and are not aware of the fact for a long time that the suffering they endure when the drug is discontinued is due to a disease they have contracted. Apparently the medical profession is also ignorant of this fact.
A more pathetic sight I have never seen than one of these patients who has been suddenly deprived of his medicine. They will tell you that they will become insane or be driven to suicide if they cannot obtain relief from their suffering. Hence their willingness to obtain the drug at any cost. I have come to believe that any man is justifiable in lying or stealing to escape the agonies I have witnessed.
It seems a crime that we of the profession have gone so long without any attempt to study or understand the disease which we in our daily rounds are constantly creating. Certainly our standard medical literature contains little if anything of value in regard to this condition, and investigation of the claims and procedure of the widely advertised so-called “treatments” and “cures” readily convinces one of their unworthiness.
I know that much can be done for the cure of these patients by an intelligent effort on the part of the medical profession, and a willingness to open their minds to the clinical facts of this condition and to handle it like other diseases.
In search of information I have gotten into touch with cases of addiction other than my brother’s, and I find that the majority of them are desperately anxious to be cured. They tell me, however, that institutions such as jails, workhouses, lunatic asylums, alcoholic wards of the charity hospitals, and those that they have tried of the advertised cures are places of insufferable torture from which they emerge in worse condition than that in which they entered.
There are estimated to be as many as 500,000 or more addiction cases in the State of New York alone. I ask in all earnestness, is it not worth while to try to do something more than we are doing for these sufferers?
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