The scene opens with a small, emotional group of family and friends huddled around the struggling alcoholic about to perform an intervention – a showdown of sorts – aimed at helping the afflicted change their ways. After an hour, the tears flow, everyone hugs each other and the alcoholic makes a miraculous recovery. On television, there’s always an easy, happy ending. Ah, if it were only that way in real life. To the uninitiated, the portrait of the alcoholic or drug abuser (who, we’ll refer to as addicts) is evident: the scruffy, unemployed middle-age man sleeping under a bridge with his bottle of Mad Dog 20/20 in a brown paper…
