Like many others, I am shocked and sorrowed by the rash of heroin-related incidents that have plagued our fine city as of late.

As I watched the news, I was taken aback by what Mayor Tom Donaldson had to say in an interview. He said, “We’re going to win this. Not today, maybe not even in my lifetime, but we’re going to win this.”

One must assume he was referring to America’s war on drugs. To this I would like to say, Mayor Donaldson, there is already a winner in the war, and it is the drugs and their distributors.

More than 45 years ago, President Richard Nixon launched the war against drugs with $100 million and a promise to spend “as much as it would take” to win.

Since then, we have spent $121 billion to arrest 37 million nonviolent drug offenders; $140 billion on imprisonment, $33 billion on Nancy Reagan’s ridiculous “just say no” campaign along with other prevention programs, and $49 billion on trying to secure our borders.

All told, we have spent more than $1 trillion in this ridiculous effort, yet drugs are more plentiful than ever.

Yes, Mayor Donaldson, the war is lost, and we are the losers. We need to rehabilitate ourselves, not others. We need to admit defeat so we can take a path that is less harmful than building more and more prisons for people need help, not rehabilitation.