Opioid Epidemic

In the late 1990’s, a new kind of drug appeared on the market that pharmaceutical companies guaranteed would be addiction-free; these drugs were called opioids. This guarantee led to more and more physicians prescribing them to their patients. As it turns out, these drugs are actually incredibly susceptible to addiction if misused, and so the opioid epidemic began.

Some opioids are illicit, like heroin, but most that are abused are prescribed. Common prescription opioids include OxyContin, Vicodin, codeine, and morphine. 21 to 29 percent of people who are prescribed opioids misuse them, and 8 to 12 percent of these people develop an opioid misuse disorder. Only 4 to 6 percent of people who abuse opioids use heroin, and 80 percent of those people began their addiction by misusing prescription medications. In 2015, 33 thousand people died from opioid overdoses, and as of March 2018, 115 people die everyday from opioid overdoses. The CDC estimates that the expense of opioid abuse to America is $78.5 billion per year. Death by overdose is not the only danger of these addictive substances. The CDC estimates that there are 119 emergency room visits and 22 hospital admissions for every one adult overdose death.

Opioid overdoses aren’t the only thing killing those who misuse them. Opana, a company that produces prescription opioids, changed the formula of their pills to make them harder to crush up and snort. Because of this, people began finding new ways to get high from the pill. This led to people injecting melted portions of the pill, which often involved needles being shared between friends and addicts. HIV broke out in pockets around the country from people sharing their needles. Now, not only are overdoses killing people, but drug use is also causing other serious long-term health risks like HIV in  people around the country.

Adolescent misuse is another one of the biggest problems resulting from the opioid epidemic. 3.6 percent of adolescents ages 12-17 reported misusing opioids in 2016, and more than half of the high school seniors who reported misusing opioids claim to have gotten them from a friend or relative. The misuse of opioids overall has decreased since 2010, but the number of overdoses in adolescents has risen.

So what’s being done in order to combat death from opioids? On October 26, 2017, President Trump declared the opioid epidemic a Nationwide Public Health Emergency. Pharmaceutical companies are attempting to make their products harder to misuse. Even state governments are taking action against the pharmaceutical companies that misrepresented their products as addiction-proof. Texas and Florida, as well as other states, have sued these companies, hoping to limit access to these drugs and to raise awareness about their addictive nature. Despite recent efforts to combat this epidemic, there is still more work to do to draw attention to and continue battling this crisis.

By Caroline Parrish