Kentucky Kernel - Dialogue: Wrong solution

NAVIGATOR

Monday, February 21, 2000

Dialogue

IN OUR OPINION

Wrong solution

Stopping drug addicts from having children misses real problem

It's a horrible sight to see babies born into this world already addicted to alcohol and illegal drugs. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, to provide an example, estimates perhaps as many as 375,000 cocaine-exposed babies are born each year in the United States.

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Check out the Children Requiring A Caring Kommunity website

http://www. cracksterilization.com

To combat the problem, Barbara Harris began the organization CRACK - Children Requiring A Caring Kommunity - in 1994. The organization offers a $200 incentive to drug/alcohol abusers to participate in long-term or permanent birth control. The offer is open to any man or woman of childbearing years who is or has been addicted to drugs or alcohol. As of February 15, 158 clients (including one man) have accepted the offer.

So it seems that Harris and associates are accomplishing their goal. But is this the best way to go about it? The root of the problem is people making poor decisions. First bad choice: becoming addicted. Second bad choice: bringing a life in the world under the influence of a controlled substance. But CRACK's method is not solving the problem. All they are doing is band-aiding the situation.

There are several flaws in their system. A person could be encouraged to have unsafe sex knowing that they have permanent or long-term birth control "protecting them." All this is a false sense of security that in turn could spread STDs on the others.

Second, are addicts really in the best frame of mind to make long-term decisions? It seems that you are a strung-out junkie just looking for anyway to get your next hit and someone offered you $200 bucks to undergo a little surgery, you would do it. You would do it without thinking that down the road you might become clean and would like to have children.

Furthermore, what if a person, after going through the CRACK program, cleans up and realizes that they want to have children. They could use the logic that they were not in their right mind when they went through the program and use CRACK for taking advantage of them when they were under the influence of drugs or alcohol.

To curb these potential situations, it would be better for the members of CRACK to educate the drug addicts and alcoholics they come across. With education and rehabilitation perhaps the individuals could get off their substances, become positive contributors to society and raise healthy, happy children.

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