The notion that we can assume people suffering from substance use disorders will freely choose what is best for them and their children is regularly undermined by reality. Too many children have paid the price.
Alcohol killed 1,547 residents last year, not much fewer than the 1,799 who died from drug overdoses. While the state increased penalties for fentanyl possessions, voters expanded access to alcohol in grocery stores.
Thirty-three states have laws that allow schools or school employees to carry, store or administer naloxone, an opioid overdose reversal medication. But some states and school districts struggle with the stigma that comes with it.
The city’s Health Department has ended its longtime sleep-off center contract with private security firm Securitas after safety and reliability concerns. But the costly replacement is just temporary, leaving the medical service’s future uncertain.
The city is pumping money into improving its first response to the drug crisis. But finding places where people can receive long-term treatment and recover is still a challenge because many patients refuse help.
Families and medical professionals say that the test strips are one of the cheapest and most effective tools at combating the fentanyl crisis. But there’s no pathway in Texas for legalization, which frustrates many.
Three years after the first-in-the-nation law was passed, a record number of opioid overdoses, bad press and a growing homelessness crisis could slow the movement to treat addiction as a public health matter.
Nationally, heat was the underlying or contributing cause of about 1,670 deaths last year, making it the highest heat-related death rate in at least two decades. Substance use, the housing crisis and an aging population contribute to the problem.
Whatever communities can do to nurture “social infrastructure” — places like movie theaters, libraries and swimming pools where people gather to form social bonds — can have a profound impact on addiction and overdose death rates.
The Livingston Parish School Board has filed a lawsuit against TikTok and Instagram, claiming the platforms are so addictive they have created a mental health crisis among the district’s students.
State legislators have passed more than 700 new laws and a variety of notable or controversial laws will take effect this week, including policies surrounding transgender athletes, chaplains in schools and a tampon tax.
The Mendocino County board of supervisors decided to use more than $63,000 of opioid settlement funds, approximately 6.5 percent of the total the county received in the first two years of distribution, to fill a $6 million budget shortfall.
The bills will make it easier to distribute the opioid reversal drug Narcan, create a curriculum on the dangers of certain drugs, fund a coordinated crisis services system, establish a task force to study alcohol pricing and addiction services, and more.
Stories and statistics point to mixed success since the new 3-digit number launched last July.
Everything from fatal overdoses to the number of people suffering from severe depression has been growing at alarming rates. Counties have been providing services but insist that Washington must do more.
The death rate in the state’s prisons increased 34.6 percent from 2018 to 2022, which saw 135 deaths. This year is surpassing 2022’s rate even as the pandemic has waned and physical mail was stopped last year.
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