Mayor Jacobs also brought up the fact that you cannot decrease demand by limiting supply. A recent crackdown on prescription opiates in Orange County is a direct cause of the recent flood of heroin to the area, an influx like none she has ever seen. During the hearing at which Mayor Jacobs testified about the heroin epidemic, Florida Representative John Mica presented a different view, stressing that treatment is less important than restriction of supply. DEA representative Louis Milione promised that his organization would work to keep heroin from entering our borders and that the DEA would help to empower communities.
Opioid Epidemic Reaches The Quaint Suburban Communities
The meth epidemic was at its peak in the early aughts, and few places were more affected that rural communities. Journalist Reding tells the story of Oelwein, Iowa (pop. 6,159), which is struggling with economic decline and an influx of the highly addictive drug. A compassionate portrayal of all those afflicted by a situation increasingly out of their control.
This is already a low-income area with a raft of other community issues, including a huge opioid epidemic and wider drug problem. Driving towards Cheshire, you can't help but notice all the billboards for veteran support groups and drug addiction recovery. This area is already struggling.
No stranger to the opioid epidemic, in 2013 Alabama became the highest prescribing state in the country of illicit substances. Physicians in Alabama prescribe more opioids than any other state. While the rates of alcohol abuse consumption is lower for Alabama residents than the rest of the national average, the most commonly abused substances include Vicodin, Xanax, and Ritalin or Adderall. In 2015, Alabama passed a law to protect "Good Samaritans" who provide help to potential victims of overdose by administering naloxone, otherwise known as Narcan, a life-saving opioid-reversal medication. In 2016, an additional law was passed to give state and county health officers the authority to write standing orders for the opioid-reversal medication.
While Arkansas hugs the Mississippi River, its beautiful terrain consists of mountains, caves, rivers and hot springs. As the state continues to boast about their infamous college team, "The Razorbacks," the rural landscapes has a widely scattered population with Little Rock resting in the center of the state as the city with the greatest density of residents. Arkansas ranks lower than the national average in regard to alcohol and cocaine abuse, however it ranks higher than the national average in abuse of methamphetamine and inhalants and sends almost as many people to rehab as alcohol. In November of 2017, HBO released a documentary titled, "Meth Storm," highlighting the depth of the drug problem and showing the lack of economic opportunity that continue to devastate rural Arkansas communities. Additionally, the state continues to struggle with the nationwide gut-wrenching opioid epidemic as the state with the 25th highest death rate in the country due to prescription drugs. According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, Arkansas had 169 opioid-related overdose deaths in 2016.
Overall, Colorado's use of alcohol and other drugs is much higher than the national average. While almost five years after the legalization of marijuana, the landscape of drug use, abuse, and addiction has changed a great deal - and most of those changes are not for the better. As medical cannabis laid the foundation for the legal pot industry that can be seen in almost every Colorado town, Coloradans are ambivalent about the issue. However, legalization of marijuana seems to be here to stay. On the flip side, opioid abuse has spread through the state, devastating rural communities as well as large metropolitan areas such as Denver. This problem has become so serious that a number of years ago, Governor John Hickenlooper played an active role in launching, "Take Meds Seriously," a public awareness campaign hoping to address prescription medication abuse. With this in such, heroin abuse has been on the rise, primarily because so many people were/are abusing prescription opioids, now both more expensive and harder to acquire for abusers. Heroin in larger areas such as Denver can be purchased for a fraction of the cost of a pill. In the Rocky Mountain region, methamphetamine is the number one drug problem and not only impacts the users of the drug, but the larger community. As a major transportation hub, Denver serves as a rail hub for the Rocky Mountain and Plains regions, as well as home to one of the largest international airports. For these reasons, Mexican cartels use the state as a shipment site for methamphetamine, heroin, and other illicit substances.
While some may picture a lush landscape of palm trees and beaches, many picture Hawaii as a breath of fresh air away from the devastation of the opioid epidemic. Some may be surprised that Hawaii faces another deadly threat in the drug world - methamphetamine. The most recent reports from the National Substance Abuse Index say that methamphetamine is Hawaii's most used drug and primary drug threat. Hawaii's pipeline for meth can be rather surprising, as couriers and parcel service members are primarily responsible for transporting crystal meth to Hawaii from the mainland, and meth lab seizures that are "conversion labs" are also prevalent throughout the islands. While meth can be considered one of the biggest problems, there are other types of drugs that are commonly abused in the state such as marijuana. While Hawaii is a High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA), its heavy tourist and commercial traffic increases drug threats and poses challenges for law enforcement each year. The state is also known to have many drug trafficking organizations, gangs, and criminal groups that have been widely known to traffic drugs throughout the islands. In recent years, the state has received multiple grants to study statewide substance abuse in order to moderate treatment accordingly. As the grants are great steps in the right direction for the drug-filled paradise, it does little help for those who are currently addicted.
Indiana is no exception to the worsening drug crisis in America, as the state ranked first in the nation for methamphetamine lab incidents in 2017. In Northwest Indiana, Starke County had the second-most per-capita meth-lab seizures in the state in 2015. Additionally, Indiana also ranked sixth for the number of drug-related arrests on college campuses, and ninth for opioid painkiller prescriptions. To combat this issue, the state passed a law last year limiting prescriptions to seven days for a person being prescribed an opiate for the first time. Recently, the state received $10.9 million from the federal government to combat the devastating opioid epidemic, 80 percent which must be spent on treatment. The State Legislature also allocated five million dollars over each of the next two fiscal years for substance abuse treatment, prevention, and enforcement.
Iowa has the second lowest rate of illegal drug use in the country, at a meandering 6.27 percent. However, the state has also continued to deal with record level methamphetamine abuse. In recent years, Iowa has cracked down on home-grown meth labs and ingredients used to make the drug and it has been a success. With 1,500 meth labs seized in 2004, the state seized less than 50 in 2017. Though, while the methamphetamine scene appears to be dwindling, the state is nowhere near from cleaning up its small-scale opioid epidemic. According to a report in 2016, opioid-related overdose deaths rose to an all-time high of 183. Marijuana use among Iowans in the state has also risen within the past three years and more people were killed in marijuana-related accidents than accidents related to any other drug, according to the Iowa Department of Transportation's most recent statistics. As for alcohol, the state's alcohol sales have steadily increased since the early 2000s. The state has no dry counties or municipalities. More recent data shows that of the people admitted to substance abuse treatment in the state, more than half were admitted because of alcohol.
With Kansas no stranger to the opioid epidemic, the St. Louis Division of the Drug Enforcement Administration revealed a report on Kansas, including its metropolitan areas such as Overland Park, Kansas City, and Olathe. This report found that black tar heroin is the primary drug threat of these larger cities and most supplies of heroin and fentanyl continue to increase. While these supplies continue to increase, so do the number of fatalities in the state. In 2000 there were 35 overdose deaths that were attributed to opioids according to the Kansas Department of Health and Environment. However in 2016, that death toll climbed to 159. The administration also found that most of the fentanyl in these areas come from China, though some is sourced from Mexico and the dark web. In addition to the opioid issue, methamphetamine and crack cocaine have been a growing concern in the state and can be found in more rural areas such as Salina or Garden City. And while street drugs continue to be an issue for the state, doctors who have over prescribed opioids have also been a large problem. In 2017, the DEA used the Kansas Board of Pharmacy's drug monitoring system, called K-TRACS, in a case that sent 23 people, including Kansas doctors and a pharmacist to federal prison.
The abuse of prescription drugs is one of the most critical public health and safety issues facing Kentucky today. Over the past decade, the number of Kentuckians who have died from drug overdoses has steadily climbed to more than 1,500 each year, continuing to devastate families, communities, social services as well as economic stability and growth. In an effort to reverse this trend, the Kentucky Justice and Public Safety Cabinet and Operation UNITE launched a new substance abuse call center to connect people across the state with drug treatment. The KY HELP Call Center has provided referrals to both public and private treatment facilities. In addition, House Bill 333 in the 2017 session was passed to limit opioid prescriptions for acute pain to a three-day supply with certain exceptions. Senate Bill 192 in the 2015 session increased penalties for traffickers and included a number of harm-reduction measures aimed at reducing overdose deaths. This law also increased penalties for trafficking in heroin, and fentanyl. 2ff7e9595c
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