Two issues present sizable challenges
THE U.S. surgeon general made some important points recently in discussing what is needed to put a dent in the nation’s opioid crisis. His comments are worth further attention.
Vice Adm. Jerome Adams, who has a brother in prison for crimes committed to support a drug habit, told a conference of law enforcement, health care groups and others that collaboration is a must in this fight.
“We cannot create behavioral and cultural change and we will not achieve our individual and mutual goals unless we sit at each other’s tables, share lessons learned and challenge each other to do better, and to do it together,” Adams said.
He spoke at a summit sponsored by the Police Associated Addiction & Recovery Initiative, which has placed thousands of opioid addicts into treatment programs instead of arresting them for drug abuse. More than 450 police departments in 30 states are part of PAARI (Oklahoma is not, according to the organization’s website).
Adams also said more needs to be done to ease the stigma associated with addiction. He urged attendees to share personal stories and ask people “how we can meet their needs.”
The conference was timely, as it was held a week after the sobering news from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that life expectancy in this country declined again in 2017. Life expectancy has either fallen or stayed flat for three straight years, the first time that’s happened in about 100 years.
The drug crisis and insufficient access to mental health care are contributing to this trend, public health experts say. More than 70,000 Americans died of a drug overdose last year, a 9.6 percent increase over the previous year. The highest death rates were among people ages 35-44, slightly ahead of the 25-34 cohort.
Federal officials said overdose deaths involving prescription painkillers and heroin were unchanged from 2016, but deaths involving fentanyl and certain other synthetic opioids increased 45 percent.
In addition, just more than 47,000 people died by suicide in 2017, a rate increase of 3.7 percent over the previous year and 33 percent since 1999. The CDC found that suicide rates in rural areas were nearly twice as high as in urban areas.
One reason why overdoses and suicides are impacting life expectancy, CDC researcher Bob Anderson says, is that they tend to involve younger populations. Deaths among younger people have a greater impact on life expectancy than do deaths among older folks.
“We’re a developed nation with vast resources,” Anderson told Politico. “There’s no reason we should be seeing life expectancy drop. This shouldn’t be happening.”
Driving down the number of deaths attributable to overdoses and suicides would help reverse this trend. Doing that in turn requires continued efforts on various fronts. It’s a monumental challenge, but one we must confront.