Distributing Funds Among Programs For Substance Abuse - Essay Example

Highlighted in yellow is where it either needs to be changed or cited because it is plagiarized (I turned it in to turnitin.com) and the highlighted sections are what needs to be fixed please. Thank you! How best to distribute funds among the various avenues for substance abuse programs. Many changes have been made throughout the years in order to provide adequate substance abuse programs for an individual to enhance a positive and healthy life in the U.S. One of the major obstacles for these programs is the rise of taxes for the American tax payer. Obama’s administration demanded about $10.7 billion in the support of programs for substance abuse and the increase of control and prevention programs. This came in the way of an increase of 1 percent for treatment and increase of 15 percent for prevention. This increase however, resulted in arguments and debates based on different assumptions regarding substance abuse programs (www.hsdl.org). The president requested a change in budgets to allow for more budget to grant more resources to combat drug treatment. The resources are classified toward “five major functions” (www.hsdl.org): 1. Substance Abuse Treatment 2. Substance Abuse Prevention 3. Interdiction 4. International Support 5. Domestic Law Enforcement One of the major complaints of many who are researching substance abuse is the fact that governments spend a much greater amount of money on enforcement, but not nearly enough on prevention and treatment options that should theoretically be much more effective at stopping drug problems. "Half the world to arrest" is a myth that is associated within this type of control policy on drugs, thereby filling the prisons with petty offenders who violate the laws established regarding drugs. The Presidents request in its budget against drugs for 2011 is to invest a large portion on the treatment and prevention of substance abuse, including new funds to support the Presidents commitment to increase the spending on treatment. This new budget divides 55 percent of the allocated funds between law enforcement, programs for international intelligence activities relating to drugs, and prohibition activities. This program, however, could fail to provide necessary funds for law enforcement officers who need to protect communities from drug users. While this legislation may be excellent at preventing the government from causing undue harm to its citizens by imprisoning them, it ignores the idea that enforcement is a necessary part of combating drug problems, to keep communities safe. These advocates ultimately believe that, the costs for substance abuse treatment and programs overwhelmingly affect spouses, parents, society and the taxpayer (Miller, 2004). Since private and public insurers do not cover drug treatment programs, governments must fill gaps in coverage. Changes make it so that local governments, as well as state governments, must fund treatment programs. Local and state governments spend much more money on substance abuse expenses than they do on other health care expenditures. In the U.S, efforts have been directed toward a systematic, rigorous and comprehensive policy specifically targeting highest risk populations. Moreover, this national policy is pursued with the greatest determination to repress, minimize or extinguish the activities of criminal organizations involved in illegal activity regarding substance abuse. It is also believed that the implementation of prevention programs are a failure when it comes to identifying the needs, abilities and all the educational culture that supports and surrounds each of the thousand places in this country (McGough & Hindman, 1986). General health care and substance abuse treatment programs have very different goals and practices. The vast majority of substance abuse programs are funded by the public taxes amounts. Private and public insurers fund most of the healthcare in the U.S. Substance abuse programs have continued to cost more and more as time goes on. Base expenditures, private insurance plans “and charity groups pay about 35 percent of substance abuse treatment costs, while the public pays approximately 65 percent” (McGrouh & Hindman 1986, 42). Hospital costs declined overall outpatient and residential drug treatment in fact increased. The bulk of this spending comes from state and local governments. The goals of the National Strategy Control of Drugs and its three goals are: stopping use before it starts, rehabilitate drug users in the United States and disrupt the market, and drive the budgeting process. The effectiveness of each program that contributes to these goals helps to determine their level of resources. Programs that demonstrate their effectiveness continue to be funded. By integrating the goals programs and performance information in the National Strategy for Drug Control, the government has laid the groundwork for a better accountability for federal funds and improved performance of programs (Horn and Kolbo, 2000). The amount of funding received by these groups is thus a subtle example of their success. Therapeutic communities provide long-term, residential care to help clients recover from drug use. Global lifestyle changes are as important as the specific use changes. These programs focus on self-help and community building These intervention “programs are highly structured and have defined rules” (Catalano, Richard and Loeber, 1999). The role they play in supervising and assisting newer residents’ increases at each stage (Catalano, Richard and Loeber, 1999). There have been a number of papers generated in the U.S. reporting improvements in the well-being of clients, in their psycho-social status, and in their ability to sustain abstinence from drugs. Length of time in treatment is an important predictor of treatment outcome. Residential rehabilitation aims to instill lasting behavioral change, thus stays of one year may be necessary. The greatest challenge, therefore, is to encourage and facilitate longer stays in residential programs. The government has been taking notable actions in order to allocate funds to the therapeutic communities to resolve the menace of substance abuse, instead of taking corrective actions in the form of home confinement. U.S government allocated $1.3 billion to serve these programs at large. However, argument against such spending questioned the capability of the approach in achieving desirable outcomes. Government spending on substance abuse programs is 1.7 billion dollars, aiming towards providing solution through education and outreach programs. This is a 13.4% overall increase as compared to 2010. The major assumptions that should be taken into consideration to support programs for substance abuse are: 1. It is the responsibility of the government to provide a community based, national prevention system in order to protect youthful offenders who are addicted to this crime. Government has included $15 million to fund an interagency pilot program that will offer prevention interventions to the people. However, most of the people argue not to spend such amounts on substance abuse because the people who are addicted to substance abuse would likely stay addicted. That the nurturing component necessary to substance abuse programs success can be lengthy and hinder cost-effective spending. 2. In support, government could develop or at least support communities who offer substance abuse programs. The government up until 2011 has been reluctant to provide assistance to communities or areas where minorities are present. $5.6 million will now be funded to these communities who are working toward prevention programs / effective strategies that minimize substance abuse. The belief here is that this will also facilitate others to join the strong workforce to fight substance abuse and increase collaboration among agencies to achieve directed goals (Hawkins, Lishner & Catalano, 1987). 3. These activities could include maintaining and establishing a drug abuse monitoring surveillance system, providing technical assistance, and building an overall support network to promote mentoring and coaching. The request included in FY 2011 was $2 million of funds for the evaluation of communities working for the prevention pilot programs. 4. Most of the people argued that a proper evaluation/performance reporting system should be incorporated to know the overall efforts. However, our government is currently establishing a performance reporting system (PRS) in order to provide accurate and timely feedback on how an agency’s efforts contributed towards the controlling of substance abuse. This system will allow policy making, resource allocation, planning, and program effectiveness. The implementation and design of the PRS have been initiated and will carry on through FY 2011 and beyond (www.hsdl.org). It is important for the government to increase the substance abuse treatment funds in order to help healthcare in the U.S, which are challenged with the current recession. In Obama’s administration the funds have been increased regarding the allocation of tax budgets for substance abuse treatments; still the rate has not been increased with the compared demands of healthcare and communities. This is increasingly creating burdens on the public tax payers in order to find cures and treatments for substance abuse.. Arguments against substance abuse treatment / programs, however, continue to be a major issue that needs to be highlighted. The public funding through taxes were increased from 50% to 60 % in just 10 years. Private spending on drugs decreased less than one percent over this period (reword this please). However, the same year insurance (private) spending on substance abuse was increased only about 1.9% annually. The government must continue to fund drug treatment programs otherwise they will fail completely to address the drug problems in the United States. Identifying particular methods that have been highly successful can be incredibly difficult but it appears that residential programs seem to be by far the most effective, in that they remove drug users from the situations that cause drug abuse and then with long-enough time frames do actually provide quality care. The problem, however, is that these are by far the most expensive models, so it might not be the best treatment per dollar, given the limited budgets that the American taxpayers are willing to provide for prevention and treatment efforts. References Catalano, Richard F. and Loeber, Rolf (1999) School and community intervention to prevent serious and violent offending, Juvenile Justice Bulletin Hawkins, J.D.; Lishner, D.M.; & Catalano, R.F. (1987) Childhood predictors and the prevention of substance abuse (National Institute on Drug Abuse Monograph 56, DHHS Publication No. ADM 87-1335: 75-126). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office Horn, Kimberly; Kolbo, Jerome R. (2000) Application of Cumulative Strategies Model for Drug Abuse Prevention Exploring Choices for High Risk Children, Journal of Drug Education 30(3): 291-312. McGough. D. P. & Hindman. M. H. (1986) A guide to planning alcohol treatment programs, Printing Office, Washington. DC Miller, J. (2004) Bad Trip: How the War Against Drugs is Destroying America. NY: Nelson Thomas. National Drug Control Budget FY 2011 (2010) Funding Highlights, Retrieved from https://www.hsdl.org/?view&did=27354, retrieved on October 21st, 2011. Read More