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Protecting children from parents drug use

Perhaps the most heartbreaking aspect of the epidemic of drug abuse is the innocent children it victimizes. Too often, right here in our area, we hear of children neglected, abused and sometimes hurt badly because the adults they trust – mom and dad – are drug addicts.

How bad is it? Officials and caseworkers in Ohio’s child protective services agency have an idea. More than 42 percent of the adults who become involved with the agency – that means people whose children are in so much danger that the state has to step in to safeguard them – have substance abuse problems.

That really should come as no surprise. But that makes the statistic no less disturbing.

Ohio Supreme Court justices hope to use a $309,000, two-year federal grant to help more children in danger because parents or guardians are hooked on drugs. The money will be used, in the words of a news report, “to help expand families’ access to drug courts to address the impact of the state’s addiction epidemic.”

High court Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor explained the idea is to identify what factors keep families from using the services that can be provided through drug courts.

Obviously, the key reason so many drug-addicted parents continue to put their children in danger – and too often, to harm them – is that they have no intention of seeking any help until and unless they are arrested.

While the high court is going its way, law enforcement agencies should safeguard children their way – by focusing on drug abusers who have children in their households. Here in our area, many police and sheriffs’ departments have had that philosophy for years. No one can say how many little boys and girls have been saved from harm because of that.

Drug addiction can make monsters out of some people. By definition, it makes them ignore their own well-being. But when they let that attitude imperil children, the state needs to step in quickly and decisively.

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