Pubdate: Mon, 19 Jun 2017
Source: Lexington Herald-Leader (KY)
Copyright: 2017 Lexington Herald-Leader
Contact: http://www.kentucky.com/369/
Website: http://www.kentucky.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/240
Author: Jared Peck

REX CHAPMAN PENS PERSONAL PLEA IN FIGHT AGAINST OPIOID ADDICTION

Rex Chapman, the onetime "King" of Kentucky basketball who saw his
life spiral into an embarrassing theft arrest as the result of his
opioid addiction, on Monday published part of his story and an appeal
for more state and federal efforts to combat America's opioid crisis.

"I know all too well how powerful the pull of opioids can be," Chapman
wrote in an article titled "Our National Pain," in Monday's issue of
Sports Illustrated. "I played basketball at Kentucky in 1986-87 and
'87-88 and enjoyed a 12-year NBA career. After multiple injuries and
seven surgeries, I developed an addiction to prescription painkillers.
My masters were Vicodin, OxyContin and Suboxone, and they led me into
a life of isolation and erratic behavior and, in the fall of 2014, to
my arrest for retail theft. (I later entered a guilty plea, paid
restitution for the items I stole and was sentenced to 750 hours of
community service.)"

Chapman has been by all accounts thriving ever since and last year
joined the UK Radio Network as one of its pregame show co-hosts ahead
of every Kentucky men's basketball game.

"Though I was fortunate enough to get a grip on my addiction, I
realize that millions of Americans are suffering. That's why I am
working to bring awareness and to influence policy makers to address
this plague. My home state of Kentucky has been especially hard hit.
In 2015, more than 1,300 Kentuckians died after drug overdoses, many
with opioids in their system."

The problem needs more state and federal funding, Chapman argued, and
he said he hoped partisan politics could be put aside to help curtail
the abuse of painkillers.

"This isn't a partisan problem," he wrote. "It's a human one."
- ---
MAP posted-by: Matt