drug addiction

How Opioids Made the Jump to Mainstream Use

Mark D. Sullivan and Jane C. Ballantyne

In no country other than the United States have prescription opioid misuse, abuse, and death rates reached epidemic proportions. These problems increased in parallel with increased prescribing for chronic pain. More and more pain conditions were being treated with opioids using higher and higher doses. Prescription opioid misuse was called out as an epidemic in 2012, but this was only the first wave of the current opioid epidemic in the United States.

‘The First Step’ Explores Van Jones’s Efforts for Prison Reform

Ulises Duenas

Jones answers these criticisms by acknowledging that years of dealing with people staying within their own tight circles has resulted in little change. He sees the value in understanding the very people who would usually oppose the efforts of those he works with. It’s an interesting perspective and it’s easy to feel frustration the way Jones does when many people choose to oppose his efforts purely because of optics and stubbornness. 

Genius and Addiction: Creative Fuel or Speedway to Self-Destruction?

Benjamin Wright

We, as a society, feel a certain loss when we lose prematurely great actors like Philip Seymour Hoffman, comic geniuses like John Belushi, music legends like Jimi Hendrix, Keith Moon and Janis Joplin, and brilliant poets like Dylan Thomas who open up our understanding of our world. But, it is also very possible that these figures, all geniuses in their own right, may never have fully realized their potential if not for their use of mind-expanding substances. It is likely that their addictions fanned the flames of their creative genius. 

Rethinking and Reforming the War on Drugs

Earl Ofari Hutchinson

In the coming weeks, Holder may tell exactly how he’ll wind that war down. It shouldn’t surprise if he does. President Obama and Holder have been hinting for a while that it’s time to rethink how the war is being fought and who its prime casualties have been. Their successful push a few years back to get Congress to finally wipe out a good deal of the blatantly racially skewed harsh drug sentencing for crack versus powder cocaine possession was the first hint. 

Obamacare Provides Significant Reform On Substance Abuse Treatment

Evelyn Robinson

After the recent election, many Americans are unsure how the health care reform bill initiated by President Obama will affect them.  This bill includes several provisions that deal with individuals seeking drug addiction prevention and treatment.  Many believe (and hope) that this plan really will make addiction care more affordable and accessible. However, although Obamacare may provide needed assistance to drug addicts, proponents and officials of the bill are hesitant to publicize these benefits in fear of the bill attaining the negative stigma often associated with drug addicts themselves.  

Miami Vice: Injection Drug Use in the Deep South

Erin N. Marcus

Hansel Tookes, age 30, is an expert at identifying the detritus of injection drug use. As a public health student on hiatus from medical school, he led a group of researchers who walked the streets of Miami for four months, methodically counting discarded syringes in neighborhoods with high rates of drug arrests. As they crisscrossed more than 800 city blocks, the team spotted 328 used syringes, in parks, lots, and along sidewalks.

Meth Addiction, Drug-Related Crimes Plague an Indian Reservation

Allie Hostler and Jacob Simas

He snorted his first line of dope when he was 15. He remembers the day. He ran with the older boys, and they tried to look out for him by refusing to rail him up. They told him, “You better not.” But it wasn’t long before his “bros” caved to his curiosity. Nor was it long before he stopped snorting, and started shooting his poison. He spent the next 21 years incarcerated or on the run, battling an addiction that swept his youth away like powder in the wind.

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