The current director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) has made a name for herself by trying to use brain scans to prove that addiction is an incurable brain disease. Despite being a flawed theory, the most damaging part of this is that is the message that is drilled down to other policy makers, state department heads, addiction treatment professionals and of course consumers. As a result they are actually steering people away from permanent recovery and into a lifelong medicated stupor at our expense and do the benefit of the drug companies.
However, despite drawing much criticism from mainstream drug rehabs, many non-12-step rehabilitation programs achieve a much higher recovery rate than any traditional treatment practices – especially those that do not try to medicate their patients or tell them they are diseased for life.
It is time for a non-governmental organization to fund a study of traditional vs. non-traditional rehab methods and make these results well publicized. In the meantime, we can assist people in locating inpatient drug rehabs that don’t follow the 12 steps and that have a very high rate of success.