Americans are killing themselves, report says

Self-destructive actions rise alarmingly in a year

Americans are becoming more selfdestructive.

While it’s no surprise that some people drink themselves to death, get hooked on lethal drugs or end their own lives, the rate of such behavior is increasing dramatically, according to a new report from the Trust for America’s Health and the Well Being Trust, both policy and advocacy non-profits.

And while rates of drug abuse and suicide among whites have long outnumbered minorities, the gap is closing fast.

Death rates from alcohol, drugs or suicide grew by 11% overall between 2015 and 2016, with drug-related deaths among blacks jumping 39%, the report found.

“What we’re seeing with this data are trends that are almost nightmarish,” said Benjamin Miller, a study author and chief strategy officer with the Well Being Trust, which aims to advance mental, social and spiritual health. “Everybody should just stop what they’re doing and pay attention to what in the world is happening here.”

Miller said he does not see these numbers tapering off anytime soon.

“These trends if anything are only going to increase,” he said.

The study only looked at the numbers — not the causes behind these trends.

But a few triggers are obvious, experts said, namely opioids, which have spread from a few doctors’ prescriptions to a national crisis, and the lack of social and economic supports.

“People do the type of self-destructive behavior and engage in it to the point of death and despair when their lives are hopeless,” said Dayna Bowen Matthew, a professor of law and public health sciences at the University of Virginia Law School.

She said the problem is not so much a racial crisis as a national one.

“When the criminal justice system, the employment system, the economy, the housing system and people’s safety nets are broken, they are in despair,” Matthew said.

Kelly Clark, president of the American Society of Addiction Medicine, which represents more than addiction specialists, said the drugs themselves are a big part of the problem.

Based in Kentucky, she said she saw the opioid epidemic begin in rural Appalachia a decade ago, with mine workers being prescribed opioids so they could work through their pain.

“We see many people who became addicted with opioids or had problems who would not have addictive disease until they were prescribed these medications,” she said. “People took the medications in order to do the work they needed to do. But our brains were not built for these opioids.”

The report should be a call to action, said Andy Slavitt, former acting administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in the Obama administration, now a senior adviser to the Bipartisan Policy Center, a non-profit Washington think-tank.

“Perhaps it’s one of these moments when for a variety of reasons people start paying attention to what’s going on,” he said.

Matthew said self-destructive behaviors also need to be addressed by providing better public housing, employment opportunities, education and family-centered treatment.

“The drum I’d like to beat the loudest is that victims of drug crises in this country should all be treated with public health tools,” she said.

“Everybody should just stop what they’re doing and pay attention to what in the world is happening here.”

Benjamin Miller Study author