It is ironic that with all the money the United States has spent on "the war on drugs" over the last 4o years, the biggest killers are perfectly legal in the U.S.: tobacco, alcohol, and prescription drugs. The number of deaths caused by "legal drugs" is far greater than what are caused by illegal drugs. About 600,000 people a year are killed by tobacco, alcohol, and prescription drugs as compared to 30,000 by street drugs.
Here at GCASA we work to reduce the demand for legal and illegal drugs by giving people accurate information and helping them to make healthy choices. We have seen a huge increase in our treatment of people addicted to opiates to the extent that we have developed a whole new opiate addiction treatment program. For more information you can ask any GCASA counselor or call John Bennett, GCASA's Director of Treatment, at 585-815-1849, or Maryann Bowman, GCASA's Director of Prevention, at 585-815-1877 or email John at jbennett@gcasa.org, or Maryann at mbowman@gcasa.org.. You can reach me, David Markham, Executive Director, at 585-815-1800 or dmarkham@gcasa.org.
The New York State Nurses Association has a EAP for nurses called SPAN. SPAN is an acronym for Statewide Peer Assistance For Nurses.
There are several peer assistance for nurses support groups in Western New York State. The regional coordinator is Paula Calleri, RN, MS, CARN. You can reach Paula at 1-800-724-6976 x355.
GCASA successfully provides treatment services for a number of health care professionals. Referrals to services such as SPAN are facilitated by GCASA counselors, but only with the consent of the client and permission to release information.
To find out more about SPAN click here.
Here is a Q&A from the Sping, 2008, SPAN newsletter.
Click on image to enlarge for easier reading.
It costs $86.00 per day to keep a male in jail in Genesee County. Genesee County does not have jail facilities for females so they are usually incarcerated in Orleans County for per diem rate of $70.00 per day after a base annual fee of $15,000.00.
As of 02/27/08 Genesee Justice was monitoring 129 defendants (101 males and 28 females.) If these defendents would have been incarcerated it would have cost Genesee county taxpayers $8,686.00 per day for the males, and $1,960.00 per day for the females.
The RUS program saves Genesee County Taxpayers $3,885,790.00.
As of 02/27/08, this caseload of defendants was supervised by one case manager costing $32,000.00 in salary plus fringe benefits.
For more information about the Genesee Justice Pre-trial release program, you can contact Ed Minardo at 585-344-2550 x2465
GCASA serves primarily two rural counties, Genesee and Orleans between two major metropolitan areas in Western New York State, Rochester and Buffalo. There was and interesting article in the Families In Society journal in April - June, 2007, Vo. 88, #2, entitled Social Workers' Suggestions for Effective Rural Practice by Joanne Riebshleger.
Here are some of the interesting ideas in the article.
There is a sense of a "rural divide", that is there is "The City" and then there is the country. Here at GCASA students from Buffalo don't want an internship in Batavia or Albion because "it's way out there" when in reality we are only 35 minutes from downtown Rochester and downtown Buffalo.
There are higher rates of poverty and scarcer formal resources but people tend to help each other out more in informal networks.
There is a slower pace of community and change. People are a little more "set in their ways."
Everything is connected and everybody tends to know everybody or "know of" everybody. This makes it a little more difficult to create professional boundaries and to avoid dual relationships.
Professional relationships tend to be "closer" and "more personal" which can make the access to service easier and sometimes more psychologically intimidating. Because of the closeness of relationships, we often see people who can afford it, commute from the community for service while poorer people, who do not have that option, must deal with the perceived shame of asking for services in their own community jeopardizing their anonymity.
There is a greater geographical span to access services and transportation is often a problem. Often professionals feel a bit more isolated because there is not so much collegial support close by.
There is an "insider group" status given to professionals who have local connections. Without that it is more difficult for "outsiders" to obtain trust and credibility.
There is a stigma attached to rural people and practice as not being as current, up to date, or as good as what is available in the city. "I'm just a country boy." "I'm not as smart as those professionals in the big city." is a common feeling and perception. Services delivered in cities are perceived as being higher quality and more expert.
Advocating for social justice in rural areas may be more difficult because of local politics and local norms and attitudes which are perpetuated by community gatekeepers who have a vested interest in the status quo and who distrust outsiders who they perceive as "coming in and trying to change things."
Working in rural communities can be very rewarding as well as challenging. Rural communities while "more political" in some ways also are less bureaucratic so it is easier to meet and develop relationships with key community leaders. In some ways in rural communities problems are easier to solve because the human dimension is on a smaller scale.
If you would like a copy of the article, email me at dmarkham@gcasa.org and I will send one to you.
To read full report click here.
An estimated 750,000 American teens and young adults are problem gamblers
according to researchers at the University at Buffalo's Research Institute on
Addictions.
Problem gambling is defined as gambling associated with three or more negative consequences, such as gambling more than you intended or stealing money to gamble.
The national telephone survey of almost 2,300 respondents, ages 14 to 21, found that 2.1 percent were problem gamblers, which works out to a nationwide total of about 750,000 young problem gamblers, the researchers said.
They also found that 11 percent of respondents gambled twice a week or more -- considered frequent gambling -- and that 68 percent of respondents said they'd gambled at least once in the past year.
The findings of the survey, conducted from August 2005 through January 2007, are
available online and were expected to be published in the June 2008 issue of the
Journal of Gambling Studies.
"In a society where young people are increasingly exposed to gambling influences, there is cause for concern," principal investigator John W. Welte said in a prepared statement.
"As might be expected, all statistically significant results showed that greater
gambling involvement is associated with aging into an adult status. In fact,
gambling may be associated with the transition into adulthood," said Welte, a
senior research scientist at the Research Institute on Addictions.
The study found that gambling increased with major life changes such as getting a
job, leaving school, living independently from parents, and marriage. Young
people who worked full-time were more likely to gamble, those who weren't in
school were more likely to gamble frequently (twice a week or more), and those
who lived independently were more likely to gamble and to be problem gamblers.
"As far as gender, it seems likely that females' gambling involvement
tends to emerge in adulthood, while male involvement can be high in adolescence.
We found identical problem gambling rates for adult males and young males (4
percent). We found adult females' gambling rates were much higher (3 percent)
than that of young females (less than one-tenth of a percent). In other words,
problem gambling is almost non-existent among female adolescents and young
adults," Welte said.
1/3 of the 1,700 kids, aged 18 - 24 killed each year from accidental injuries (including motor vehicle crashes), homicide and suicide occur during prom and graduation season.
Because of this heightened concern and awareness I have been asked to give some presentations at some of the local high schools. I have three scheduled this year, and the last two days I have given two, and next week I will do the third. These presentations are given to high school assemblies of seniors, and in some cases seniors and juniors, about DWI and making "good choices". This has been less than satisfying for me for a whole bunch of reasons. However I have been given an opportunity to review some of the data and I thought I would share some of it here because I think it is instructive in many ways of the kind of society we are living in.
1 in 3 12th graders report, on survey, that they have binge drank (5 or more drinks on a single occasion) in the last two weeks. This data is pretty consistent in Genesee County,NY, New York State as a whole, and across the country.
Goofing on the 150 or so juniors and seniors I talked with this morning, I asked them to raise their hands if they had binge drank in the last two weeks. Surprisingly about twenty hands went up and one kid shouted out laughing, "Yeah, I got wasted!!!", the kids around him laughed.
I asked them why they think so many kids binge drink and they shouted, "Because it's fun."
I guess it is to a point. BUT.............................................................
90% of the estimated college rapes per year (97,000) occur when the victim, perpetrator, or both are intoxicated. I live in a college town and I remember a few years ago seeing an article in the college newspaper reporting that 11 rapes had been reported to campus security that year. I was startled. Is that high, low, under reported? I thought rape was a serious felony crime and rapists, if convicted, go to prison. Are college student rapes on a college campus reported to campus security handled differently? Is this a different type of crime?
25% of sexually active college students , or about 400,000 college students between the ages of 18 - 24 per year, report having unprotected sex per year while under the influence. Studies have found that 20- 25% of young women are infected with a STD like chlamydia and/or gonorrhea without knowing it.
11% of college students report perpetrating property damage while intoxicated.
25% of college students report symptoms of academic failure ( missing classes, late papers, doing poorly on exams) because of alcohol.
Alcohol is readily accepted in our society and glamorized in commercials and advertisements constantly. Is it any wonder that "getting wasted" and "to party" have become synonymous?
After my two kids were killed in a drunk driving crash, perhaps I am over sensitive, but the tragedies and heartache caused by alcohol, it seems to me, far outweigh its benefits and pleasure especially when used to excess as the youth in our society seem to do in significant numbers.
Here is my daughter Brigid in her Irish dancing dress before a performance when she was 5 about a week before she was killed.
Brigid Kathleen Markham
04/11/87 – 03/10/93
Here is my son Ryan in his Irish dancing outfit before a performance about a week before he was killed .
Ryan John Patrick Markham
05/09/84 – 03/10/93
Here is the 18 Wheeler tractor trailer that smashed into the car driven by my wife and with four of my children in it. It was the driver's third DWI.
This is me, a tired old man, talking about it after 15 years. Had they not been killed at age 5 and 8, Brigid would be 21 today, and Ryan would be 24. I miss them terribly. They were great kids and would have been outstanding adults. Our world is poorer for not having them in it.
