| ||Minding Your Mind || | Time To Stop Just Saying No Last
reviewed and revised on June 17, 2011 By Michael Craig Miller,
M.D. Harvard Medical School Just say no? It turns out that such
an approach to treating addictions never made much sense. What
scientists have learned about the biology of addiction should
help them persuade policy makers if they're listening to move
resources off the borders, out of courts and prisons, and into
the clinic. Addiction is a chronic illness that is as expensive
as it is tragic. It affects more than 20 million Americans and
costs our nation almost $500 billion per year more than diabetes
and cancer combined. The difficulty with addiction is not the
product of bad character or weak moral fiber. Rather, it results
from brain circuits being on the blink. Back to top Hijacking
the Reward System Addictive substances commandeer the brain's
reward system and undermine people's determination to make wise
choices, even when they know they are likely to suffer as a
result. Since faulty