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 The plan, unveiled early last month, focuses on treating
addiction, including $7.5 billion to support state treatment
programs, emphasizing treatment over prosecution for low-level drug
offenses and equipping all first responders with the drug naloxone,
which can reverse opioid overdoses.
Addictions affect some 23 million Americans, or about one in every
14 people, according to federal data.
Clinton, who will be joined by Boston Mayor Marty Walsh, has said
she seized on addiction as a key issue after hearing questions about
it repeatedly while talking with voters on campaign stops.
The change in focus towards steering low-level addicts to treatment,
rather than prison, is a welcome one, said Dr. Jeffrey Samet, a
specialist in clinical addiction research at Boston University's
School of Medicine.
 "Nothing gets achieved by putting them into jail," Samet said. "Many
of them, not all, but many, want to stop using as much as we want
them to stop. Putting them in jail, most of them won't use while
they are in, but once they're out, they start using again."
Abuse of opioid drugs is a particular problem in the northeastern
United States, following a pattern where a patient is prescribed a
painkiller after an injury or surgery, turns to illicit sources of
that drug and later progresses on to heroin, which is cheaper and
more widely available, experts said.
Heroin usage in the United States more than doubled from 2007 to
2013, according to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health.
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Walsh, a recovered alcoholic, has made addressing addiction a key
element of his time in office, boosting spending for treatment
programs and setting up a city hotline to direct addicts to
available treatment slots.
Clinton is far from the only White House contender to emphasize
treating addiction. New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, a Republican
and former federal prosecutor, has also hailed treatment as a smart
way to tackle the problem.
Samet said he was glad to see the White House race focus new
attention on addiction and treatment.
"It has been under the radar for far too long," Samet said.
(Reporting by Scott Malone; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)
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