MYTH: People don't need treatment. They can stop using drugs if they really want to.FACT: It is extremely hard for people addicted to drugs to achieve and maintain long-term abstinence. Research shows that long-term drug use actually changes a person's brain function, causing them to crave the drug even more, making it increasingly difficult to quit without effective treatment. Intervening and stopping substance abuse early is important, as children become addicted to drugs much faster than adults and risk greater physical, mental and psychological harm.

<B>MYTH: People who continue to abuse drugs after treatment are hopeless.FACT:</B> Completing a treatment program is merely the first step in the struggle for recovery that can last a lifetime. Drug addiction is a chronic disorder; occasionally relapses do not mean failure. Psychological stress from work or family problems, social cues such as meeting someone from the drug-using past or the environment — encountering streets, objects or even smells associated with drug use can easily trigger a relapse. Addicts are most vulnerable to drug use during the few months immediately following their release from treatment. Recovery is a long process and frequently requires multiple treatment attempts before complete and consistent sobriety can be achieved.

<B>MYTH: Treatment for addiction should be a one-shot deal.FACT: </B>Like many other illnesses, drug addiction typically is a chronic disorder. Some people can quit drug use "cold turkey," or they can stop after receiving treatment just one time at a rehabilitation facility. But most people who abuse drugs require longer-term treatment and, in many instances, repeated treatments.

<B>MYTH: Drug addiction is voluntary.FACT: </B>You start out occasionally using alcohol or other drugs, and that is a voluntary decision. But as time passes, something happens and you become a compulsive drug user. Why? Because over time, continued use of addictive drugs changes you brain — in dramatic, toxic ways at times, more subtly at others, but virtually always in ways that result in compulsive and even uncontrolable drug use.

<B>MYTH: Treatment just doesn't work.FACT: </B>Studies show drug treatment reduces drug use by 40 percent to 60 percent and can significantly decrease criminal activity during and after treatment. There also is evidence that drug addiction treatment reduces the risk of infectious disease, hepatitis and HIV infections. Intravenous-drug users who enter and stay in treatment are up to six times less likely to become infected with HIV. Treatment also improves the prospects for getting and keeping a job up to 40 percent.

<B>MYTH : You can't force someone into treatment.FACT: </B>Treatment does not have to be voluntary. Those coerced into treatment by the legal system can be just as successful as those who enter treatment voluntarily. Sometimes they do better, as they are more likely to stay in a treatment longer and to complete the program. In 1999, more than half of adolescents admitted into treatment were directed to do so by the justice system.

<B>MYTH: Drug addiction is a character flaw.FACT: <B>Drug addiction is a brain disease. Every type of drug, from alcohol to heroin, has its own mechanism for changing how the brain functions. But regardless of the addiction, the effects on the brain are similar, ranging from changes in the molecules and cells that make up the brain to mood and memory processes. They can even permanently effect motor skills, such as walking and talking. The drug becomes the single most powerful motivator in your life.