"There is not a day that goes by that I don't receive one or two calls regarding an overdose. In the past year alone I have gone to well over 15 levayos [funerals] of teens at risk."
A reader writes:
Dear Shmarya,
I want to thank you for standing up when so few of us truly care. Although I don't always agree with you on many subjects, I commend you for tackling issues that are threatening the frum community.
As a person who gives freely of his time and money to help teens at risk, I ask, beg of you to please make this more of an issue
There is not a day that goes by that I don't receive one or two calls regarding an overdose. In the past year alone I have gone to well over 15 levayos [funerals] of teens at risk.
I see the coverage being given to the sad situation in Skever, yet I am amazed that there was no coverage of a teen that died from suicide two weeks ago in Monsey.
We have a problem of epic proportions in our Jewish frum communities, yet we hardly hear a peep???
Around the globe parents cry their hearts out from behind closed doors, hoping for some solution to this issue, yet most rabbonim and lay leaders refuse to deal with it?
When I asked the head of Agudath Yisroel, Rabbi Chaim Zwiebel, why his organization refuses to do more, I got this as a reply, ‘Agudah is a solution-based organization, and this issue there is no solution.’!!!
I can't continue to hear the pain any longer.
I ask that perhaps you can start to focus more on this issue. I truly believe the more we talk and debate this cause, the faster the rabbonim will begin to deal with it.
With wishes for a happy and safe summer,