-
+45 +1
New, implantable treatment for opioid addiction could be game-changer
Whether a person is hooked on heroin or pain pills, it is next to impossible to break the cycle.
-
+5 +1
State assembles Narcan 'rescue kits' in hopes of preventing overdose deaths
In the storage room of a Wasilla boutique, 35 volunteers worked a makeshift assembly line Thursday, putting together kits to fight heroin overdose and hoping to save lives. Much of the work was done by people recovering from drug addiction. The crew assembled 1,500 rescue kits, each with nasal spray doses of the drug naloxone, known by the brand name Narcan, which reverses the effect of opioids. Getting the rescue drug into the hands of the people closest to the addicts at risk is an ongoing project run by the state's Department of Health and Social Services.
-
+16 +1
'Dose as small as a grain of sand can kill you': alarm after Canada carfentanil bust
It was a carbon monoxide alarm that brought the Canadian authorities to the house in Liatris Drive, a quiet residential street lined with manicured gardens. As firefighters checked over the house to ensure its inhabitants were safe, something else caught their eye: kilograms of a mysterious powder sitting in the basement.
-
+23 +1
Economic cost of the opioid crisis: $1 trillion and growing faster
The economic cost of the growing opioid epidemic topped an estimated $1 trillion from 2001 through 2017, according to an analysis released Tuesday. And the opioid crisis is projected to cost the United States an extra $500 billion through 2020 unless sustained action is taken to stem the tide, the report from health research and consulting institute Altarum said.
-
+24 +1
Americans Invented Modern Life. Now We’re Using Opioids to Escape It.
The scale and darkness of this epidemic is a sign of a civilization in a more acute crisis than we knew. This nation pioneered modern life. Now epic numbers of Americans are killing themselves with opioids to escape it.
-
+25 +1
Opinion: The Opioid Crisis Isn't A Metaphor
Drug users don't take heroin because of postindustrial despair — they do it because withdrawal feels worse than anything you can imagine.
-
+32 +1
Is chronic pain something more people should accept?
Amid the opioid crisis, the concept of “pain acceptance” is gaining credibility.
-
+11 +1
If You Want to Kill Drug Dealers, Start with Big Pharma
Big corporations, not street dealers, are the true authors and profiteers of the opioid crisis... At a recent rally in New Hampshire, Donald Trump called for the death penalty for drug traffickers as part of a plan to combat the opioid epidemic in the United States. At a Pennsylvania rally a few weeks earlier, he called for the same.
-
+16 +1
Legalising cannabis could help solve America's opioid crisis, two scientific studies suggest
Legalised cannabis use may help solve America’s opioid crisis, two scientific studies have suggested. Two separate peer-reviewed studies in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine found significant drops in opioid prescribing in US states that had relaxed their cannabis laws.
-
+26 +1
How Can Science Combat the Opioid Crisis?
What opioid addiction treatments are more effective and can we vaccinate against addiction?
-
+17 +1
Amid the opioid epidemic, white means victim, black means addict
America’s social hierarchies rule everything – even the opioid epidemic. You don’t have to dig deep to find the hypocrisy and insult to people of color.
-
+16 +1
Getting off opioids: Patients turn to pot over pills
In 2016, opioids killed more Americans than breast cancer. The drug overdose epidemic has become one of the most concerning public health issues of recent time, and in an effort to stem the tide, moreg and more patients and doctors are turning to pot over pills. For much of the past two decades, 51-year-old Angie Slinker took a cocktail of narcotics, antidepressants and anti-anxiety medications to manage the pain stemming from a car accident in 1998.
-
+15 +1
Lawyer who sued Big Tobacco and won turns his sights to opioid makers
Mississippi's Mike Moore says prescription drug companies are responsible for the nation's opioid addiction crisis.
-
+2 +1
Trying Physical Therapy First For Low Back Pain May Curb Use Of Opioids
Though Americans spend an estimated $80 billion to $100 billion each year in hopes of easing their aching backs, the evidence is mounting that many pricey standard treatments — including surgery and spinal injections — are often ineffective and can even worsen and prolong the problem.
-
+32 +1
Sewage Is Helping Cities Flush Out the Opioid Crisis
Poop studies are helping communities make intervention decisions
-
+11 +1
Deadly fentanyl forces sites to call professionals
The tragic business of cleaning up deadly fentanyl overdose sites is booming — with calls flooding in for hazmat responses to hotels, schools, ball fields, public restrooms and even rental cars, where addicts have been shooting up drugs.“It’s increased tremendously in the last 18 months and even more specifically in the last 12 months,” said Michael Wiseman of Easton-based 24 Trauma, a commercial crime-scene cleanup service that now gets up to 10 OD cleanup calls a week.
-
+13 +1
Rate of Babies Born to Opioid Addicted Mothers Quadruples
The number of women giving birth while addicted to opioids more than quadrupled between 1999 and 2014, according to new data published Thursday by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The data illustrates, among other things, “the devastating impact of the opioid epidemic on families across the U.S., including on the very youngest,” said CDC director Dr. Robert Redfield. “Each case represents a mother, a child, and a family in need of continued treatment and support.”
-
+2 +1
We’re failing in the opioid crisis. A new study shows a more serious approach would save lives.
The study suggests a comprehensive approach is needed — one that goes way further than what America has done so far.
-
+20 +1
Experimental painkiller molecule as powerful as morphine, but not addictive
As an opioid epidemic spreads across the western world, researchers believe they’re close to developing a non-addictive painkiller. Figures from the US National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) estimate that about 115 people in the country are overdosing on opioids every single day. Aside from the financial costs such an addiction brings to a national healthcare system, it can be hugely traumatic for the person addicted to these drugs, and for their families.
-
+29 +1
OxyContin Billionaire to Sell Drug to Get You Off OxyContin
Pharmaceutical billionaire Richard Sackler, whose family-owned company Purdue Pharma created the notorious drug OxyContin, has been granted a patent for a new drug designed to help wean people off that highly addictive opiate. Purdue has been named as one of the key drivers in an opioid epidemic that is killing tens of thousands of Americans every year. The Financial Times reports that Sackler now stands to make millions more dollars from a milder opiate that would be sold to people addicted to more powerful drugs like heroin or OxyContin.
Submit a link
Start a discussion