Alcohol & Substance Abuse

Health and Social Services was the department that received the deepest cuts. They include eliminating $5.18 million in cash assistance to seniors, and $3 million in behavioral health grants.

The goal is to reduce the city’s death toll from heroin. But it would be breaking various laws unless Ithaca gets a pass from the governor and federal authorities.

“This is hard stuff. If it was easy, Alaska would have done it long ago,” Health Commissioner Valerie Davidson told lawmakers.

In the first two weeks after a drug user is released from jail, the risk of a fatal overdose is much higher than at any other time in his addiction. After months or years in confinement, theoretically without access to illicit drugs, an addict’s tolerance for drugs is low but his craving to get high can be as strong as ever.

Thirty-three Alaskans died from heroin overdoses last year, a dramatic increase from just five years ago, when only four died.

Addicts who quit drugs under an abstinence-based program are at a high risk of fatally overdosing if they relapse. Within days, the abstinent body’s tolerance for opioids plummets and even a small dose of the drugs can shut down the lungs.