PODCAST — The History of NON-DISEASE Addiction Treatment

Tom Horvath (SMART Recovery) and Stanton Peele  delve into their decades’ long association in the battle to establish non-disease, harm reduction treatment in the United States.

Their connection is supportive, even affectionate. Each in their own way — Tom through his decades of establishing an international association of SMART Recovery groups, Stanton by attacking the disease lobby — has contributed to a shift in the treatment paradigm.

Both SMART Recovery and the Life Process Program focus anti-addiction efforts through support for people’s functioning, and not in terms of their use of substances. Both look forward rather than backward.

They end their discussion by considering whether, in accepting the accolades of Nora Volkow, Tom and SMART have created a system clearly distinct from the disease monolith.