The article about treatment versus punishment for drug use (Page 10A, March
18) might have served us better on the front page under the headline ``How
we can reduce crime, save lives and money, and build fewer prisons.''

The cited bipartisan study points out that drug treatment carries less than
one-third the cost of imprisonment, is more successful at reducing both
drug use and crime and cuts dramatically into the spread of AIDS. The
amazing main point of the article is that despite the overwhelming
advantage of treatment over imprisonment, the American public prefers by
far to punish drug users rather than treat them.

Is it a sane society that chooses to throw away money and lives when the
means of saving both is so readily at hand? And why do we condemn the users
of some chemicals to prison while we celebrate the most dangerous drug of
all, alcohol, with wine and beer festivals?

John W. Olver
San Jose