Growing up, Evan Blessett was as an avid soccer player and honor roll student. He loved skateboarding and played the drums later in his teen years. But one role that his dad, Doug, never thought his son would play was one of a recovering drug addict. "The thing that gets me is he got past us," Doug Blessett said about his 29-year-old son, who is a counselor at The Healing Place, an addiction recovery center in Louisville. "When my son went through this, I took it personally. You think you would see it, and I didn't." [continues 1428 words]
[photo] Dr. Deepak Ariga holds a needle favored by drug users in Hammond on April 9, 2015. (Jim Karczewski, Post-Tribune) An HIV outbreak in Scott County, Ind., has infected 106 people. Can needle exchanges stem the tide? An HIV outbreak in Scott County, Ind., has infected 106 people thus far, and despite reservations, Gov. Mike Pence green-lit a 30-day needle exchange program to stem the tide. But public health advocates say the exchange program should be extended to really make an impact and expanded across the state as such programs have been shown to be effective in stemming the tide of HIV and hepatitis C infection among IV drug users. [continues 1235 words]
It's an uphill battle [photo] (John Dole / Scripps Research Institute) Kim Janda of the Scripps Research Institute is shown in front of a board that depicts molecule drawings of heroin and cocaine, with the structures of vaccines that potentially could target those two drugs shown beneath. In one picture, H. Joseph "Joey" Ressler is smiling at his mother and lifting her off the ground. In another, a selfie, he's grinning like a little kid as two motorcyclists roar up from behind. He was just 24, and the future seemed limitless for the happy, talented young man. [continues 1151 words]
It took me awhile to perfect the cookie recipe. I experimented with ingredients: Blueberry, Strawberry, Sour Diesel, White Widow, Bubba Kush, AK-47 -- all strains of cannabis, which I stored, mixed with glycerin, in meticulously labeled jars on a kitchen shelf. After the cookies finished baking, I'd taste a few crumbs and annotate the effects in a notebook. Often, I felt woozy. One variation put me to sleep. When I had convinced myself that a batch was okay, I'd give a cookie to my 9-year-old son. [continues 1942 words]
A drug that can stop a heroin overdose, and potentially save a life, is available in Wisconsin. One agency provides the doses at no cost. But it's against the law for an individual with a prescription for naloxone, commonly known by its brand name Narcan, to use the drug on a friend or someone else overdosing on other opiates such as morphine, oxycodone and methadone. A recent report from the State Council on Alcohol and Other Drug Abuse has recommended a 911 Good Samaritan Law to state lawmakers that, among other provisions, would offer limited immunity in such cases. [continues 957 words]
Recent headlines tell it all: "9 dead from apparent heroin ODs over weekend in Kensington area"; "Medical examiner: Philly overdose surge may have killed 35 over 5 days"; "New Jersey's overdose nightmare hits a new peak"; and "Growth in the use of opioids is fueling a nationwide epidemic of deaths from drug overdose". Heroin mixed with fentanyl - or heroin alone - may be responsible for this surge in overdoses. In the past, Philadelphia typically had three overdoses a day and they were not all fatal. Last June, the Philadelphia Medical Examiner's Office confirmed nearly 700 drug-related deaths in 2015, twice as many deaths as there were from homicides. At the current rate, 2016 will end with even more. [continues 619 words]
Teaching in a large urban secondary school of 3,000 grade 8-12s in the early 1970s, I knew we had several students with a serious drug problem. We knew who they were and the school did what it could, but it was a losing proposition. Later, as an administrator in that same school and still later as a superintendent in a different school district, I knew some students had serious drug problems. Right up to retirement, when I was asked: "So the schools have a drug problem?" my answer was always: "No, but a few students have serious problems, and students have these problems only if there are drug problems in the community - schools don't exist in a vacuum." [continues 577 words]
The opioid epidemic ripping throughout the nation and our own backyard will not be stopped without the multi-pronged approach that is thankfully occurring on all levels of government. Local, state and national leaders have stepped up to provide assistance. Police, fire departments, ambulance crews, hospital staffs and others are on the front lines of this fight. Last month proved deadly in Erie County, with public officials reporting at least 42 suspected opioid overdose deaths, half of them since Dec. 19 and six alone on Dec. 27. [continues 451 words]
Dr. James Patrick Murphy, a nationally-recognized pain medicine specialist, balances guidelines meant to lessen the risks of addiction with a patient's need for pain relief, examines Marta D. Thomas of Old Louisville. Thomas is a volunteer at Kosair Pediatric Convalescent Center and receives radiofrequency lesioning (which melts the covers off nerves so they don't transmit pain for 4-6 months.) 27 October 2016(Photo: David R. Lutman/Special to The C) Cattle farmer Marquis Smith is in pain, but he doesn't get sick leave. [continues 1207 words]
[photo] What looks like oxycodone pills are actually fentanyl. The pills were seized and submitted to crime labs in Tennessee. (Tommy Farmer The Associated Press( [photo] Fentanyl is often legally prescribed to cancer patients to manage pain. It comes in patches and lozenges. (Tom Gannam Associated Press file) It was March when fentanyl, a synthetic opioid 100 times more powerful than morphine, insinuated itself into Sacramento County. In a matter of weeks, dozens of people overdosed. The drug killed 12 people, including Jerome Butler, a 28-year-old father of three young children. [continues 528 words]
Pa. Physician General Dr. Rachel Levine during a meeting with the staff of the Twin Lakes treatment facility near Somerset for people suffering with alcohol and substance abuse. Pennsylvania's avalanche of opioids that rolled from factories through pharmacies to medicine cabinets, and then tumbled into the streets with tragic results, may finally be slowing thanks to pressure on the prescribing practices of its doctors. This year, the long-lagging state caught up with the regulatory steps of many of its neighbors, as Gov. Tom Wolf and legislators from overdose-plagued districts wrote new laws. Initial data suggests that attention to the overprescribing of opioids - widely blamed for starting addictions that progress to heroin use - has started to affect doctors' decisions. [continues 710 words]
The 44-year-old mother who answered the door in Lincoln-Lemington on the evening of Dec. 15 had the "pin point" eyes of "someone who has recently used opioids," a Pittsburgh police officer wrote. The officer was responding to a 911 call suggesting child endangerment. "I do suffer from using heroin and I'm trying to stop, but I keep using," the woman admitted, according to the officer's affidavit. She led police to the makeup bag under the throw pillow, where they found six stamp bags of heroin and three hypodermic needles, the officer wrote. [continues 3159 words]
Twenty people have died of probable heroin overdoses in Milwaukee County since July 27. The Milwaukee County medical examiner's office says this is a photo of a typical drug-overdose death scene.(Photo: Milwaukee County Medical Examiner's Office, Milwaukee County Medical Examiner 's Office) Twenty people have died of probable heroin overdoses in Milwaukee County during the past two weeks, a toll the county medical examiner's office on Thursday called "unprecedented." The county typically averages one heroin death every three days, the office said. The medical examiner is investigating the possibility that other drugs, such as fentanyl, played a role in the deaths. [continues 390 words]
[photo] Toby Talbot / APWith prescriptions dropping in the United States, companies have started to promote OxyContin and other opioid drugs in Latin America, Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. A former adjunct associate professor at Temple University has helped a leading maker of opioids promote potentially addictive pain medications in new foreign markets that have not yet seen an overdose crisis like that in the United States, a Los Angeles Times investigation has found. The physician, Joseph V. Pergolizzi Jr., is based in Naples, Fla., and has not been affiliated with Temple since June 2014, the school said. [continues 331 words]
Pharmaceutical distributor settles claims it failed to report suspicious orders from Maryland, elsewhere One of the nation's largest pharmaceutical distributors has agreed to pay $44 million to resolve federal claims that it did not report suspicious orders of the prescription painkiller oxycodone from pharmacies in Maryland, Florida and New York. Dublin, Ohio-based Cardinal Health Inc.'s civil settlement is one of the largest ever in a drug diversion case, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. The settlement comes as federal law enforcement works to curb a stubborn opioid epidemic that was linked to almost 1,100 overdose deaths in Maryland last year. More than 350 were linked directly to prescription painkillers. [continues 637 words]
Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Darinka Mileusnic-Polchan speaks as the Regional Forensic Center released its 2010-2015 Drug-related Death Report for Knox And Anderson Counties Monday, August 15, 2016 in the small assembly room at the City-County Building. (MICHAEL PATRICK/NEWS SENTINEL) Dr. Amy Hawes, assistant medical examiner, explains a portion of the Regional Forensic Center's 2010-2015 Drug-related Death Report for Knox And Anderson Counties on Monday, Aug. 15, 2016, in the Small Assembly Room at the City County Building. (MICHAEL PATRICK/NEWS SENTINEL) [continues 1467 words]
Tennessee looks at making naloxone, an easy-to-administer drug that can reverse the effects of opioid drug overdoses, widely available without a prescription. But will over-reliance on the medication be a long-term side effect? [photo] Thomas Clemons instructs people visiting a Baltimore needle exchange van on how to use naloxone to reverse heroin overdoses. More and more states, including Tennessee, are looking at the easy-to-administer drug as a way to stem increasing opioid overdose deaths.(Photo: Amy Davis/File) [continues 1422 words]
WASHINGTON (AP) - No one knew what was in the baggie. It was just a few tablespoons of crystalline powder seized back in April, clumped like snow that had partially melted and frozen again. Emily Dye, a 27-year-old forensic chemist at the Drug Enforcement Administration's Special Testing and Research Laboratory, did not know if anyone had died from taking this powder, or how much it would take to kill you. What she did know was this: New drugs were appearing in the lab every other week, things never before seen in this unmarked gray building in Sterling, Virginia. Increasingly, these new compounds were synthetic opioids designed to mimic fentanyl, a prescription painkiller up to 50 times stronger than heroin. [continues 2297 words]
WINNIPEG School Division is considering stocking its schools with the antidote naloxone in case any student suffers an opioid overdose. "We need to pay attention to it," trustee Lisa Naylor said Thursday. "It may be something we deem as a good idea, as part of a first aid kit." Naylor raised the possibility at a school board meeting earlier this month and was told the WSD administration was already looking into it. Naylor said a parent, who is also a doctor, had told her another unidentified school division is also considering putting naloxone kits in schools. [continues 791 words]
