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Essay On Opioid Addiction Crisis

540 Words3 Pages

The Opioid Addiction Crisis is the worst troublesome addiction crisis in American history. Each year, drug overdoses is responsible for more than 64,000 deaths and the nation’s life expectancy has dropped for two years in a row. Opioids are substances that act on opioid receptors to produce effects similar to morphine in hopes to relief pain. An Ohio deputy sheriff named Bender has stated a powerful statement reading, “Opioids reach every part of society; blue collar, white collar, everybody. It’s nonstop, it every day. And it does not seem like it is getting any better.” Since the opioid addiction crisis is this brutal, the United states government is calling this epidemic a nationwide public health emergency; and not a national emergency. Legal opioid prescriptions are an …show more content…

Types of opioid include, codeine, heroin, morphine, meperidine etc. There are about 1.9 million Americans which is 0.8% that are reported to have an opioid addiction (Green 2017). It’s also been started that roughly 11.5 million of people have misused prescription opioids that they have received through illicit means. Increases in deaths involving prescription opioids starting in 1999. Each day, there are around 142 Americans that die from opioids (Green 2017). In 2016, over 64,000 people deaths were recorded that were opioid-related. The percentage increase of opioid-related deaths among adults aged 55-64 jumped from 4.2 per 100,000 people in 1999 to 21.8 in 2015 (Green 2017). There is numerous amount of reasons a person can get addicted to opioids; it may begin as an experiment, many are curious on how and what it feels like, and peer pressure from fellow friends. Another reason someone may abuse opioid is they begin taking their prescribed opioids due to surgery or chronic pain, but they are cut off from them, and they now have become addicted and need more (Green

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Recent reforms can curb the opioid epidemic. Yes, health care professionals have realized the complex problem and they now understand the problem and what needs to be done. According to CQ Researcher, “Experts see some progress in the fight against opioid painkiller abuse. After peaking in 2012, the number of prescriptions written for opioids declined 12 percent between 2013 and 2015, according to IMS Health, a market research company. Symphony Health Solutions, a data company that studies the pharmaceutical industry, found an 18 percent drop in that period.”

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Underlying Causes: The increase in the sale of opioids is considered to be the root of the opioid crisis, as the drugs have been proven to be highly addictive. An addiction to prescriptive opioids, however, can lead to an addiction to synthetic, illegal opioids, such as heroine or fentanyl, which are less expensive and easier to acquire. In fact, in their journal article, “Associations of nonmedical pain reliever use and initiation of heroin use in the United States” Pradip Muhuri and associates discovered that “the recent (12 months preceding interview) heroin incidence rate was 19 times higher among those who reported prior nonmedical prescription pain reliever (NMPR) use than among those who did not (0.39 vs. 0.02 percent)” (Muhuri et. al). In other words, abusing prescription opioids significantly raises the chances of abusing illicit drugs, such as heroin.

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Within the last 22 years, from 1991 to 2013, the prescriptions written by doctors for opioids have increased from 76 million to 207 million. Opioids are a drug class that were developed originally, to treat severe pain for people who are dying of cancer or other severe illnesses. This began when pharmaceutical companies assured the medical community that people would not become addicted to opioid pain relievers. As a result doctors began to prescribe opioids more frequently. There are different kinds of opioids.

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Today, a crisis called the opioid epidemic is currently rising. The opioid epidemic is the use of prescription and nonprescription opioids. Examples of opioid drugs are heroin, oxycodone, hydrocodone, morphine, and many others. The opioid epidemic is swiftly increasing in the United States; however, it can rapidly decrease if people were to do these things: aware the new generation of the effects, provide the ill with better treatment options, and put a stop to overprescribing.

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Opioids are drugs, used as medication, to relieve pain, when administered properly. However, these drugs are extremely addictive when abused, often causing fatality due to overdose. While doctors may prescribe many different opioids as anesthesia and treatment for pain in cancer patients, there are many that still

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America has been suffering from opioid crisis according to “America’s Opioid Crisis” by Chris Mc Greal. Doctors have an open a legal gateway to drugs through the opioids prescribed excessively. American government is ignoring the epidemic issue of the opioid crisis because it produces a lot of money. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) who is responsible to protect our health and make sure our safety has disregarded their responsibilities and geared its focus in money being produced by approving the mass prescribing of pills. America blames the addicts and turns a blind side due to the lack of restrictions and money being made.

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Since the opioid crisis is so widespread and vastly growing, attention is brought to a nation level. Victims of the opioid crisis mainly stem from normal lives, obtaining opioids as a form of legitimate pain management for medical reasons. Upon prolonged use of these opioids

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It has become vitally important for all U.S. citizens to be made aware of this epidemic, and to be informed on the highly addictive traits that accompany any form of opioid or opiate. As well, there are many growing problems facing opioid addicts and how to go about treating individuals who are seeking help for their addiction, mainly due to the controversies concerning MAT or Medically-Assisted Treatment. Ms. Szalavitz writes “The Wrong Way to Treat Opioid Addiction” to argue towards the effectiveness on MAT, and how patients struggling with addiction may require more than just abstinence to fully recover. She wants anyone reading her Op-Ed to be made aware of the importance of MAT and to shed light on its necessity in helping to overcome our nation’s

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Dependence on prescription opioids can stem from treatment of chronic pain and in recent years is the cause of the increased number of opioid overdoses. Opioids are very addictive substances, having serious life threatening consequences in case of intentional or accidental overdose. The euphoria attracts recreational use, and frequent,

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“Everyday, more than 115 people in the United States die after overdosing on opioids,” (National Institute on Drug Abuse, 2018, Opioid Overdose Crisis). Opioid drug abuse has become a growing issue in the United States since the late 1990s. “In the late 1990s, pharmaceutical companies reassured the medical community that patients would not become addicted to prescription opioid pain relievers, and healthcare providers began to prescribe them at greater rates,” (Public Affairs, 2018, What is the U.S. Opioid Epidemic?). Opioids can be either prescription medications such as morphine, however heroin is also considered to be an opioid. Opioids have been proven to be highly addictive, and there has been an increase in misuse and overdose of opioid drugs.

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There are about two million people in the United States who are addicted to opioids, and ever since the 1990’s, the problem has continued to increase. Thousands of people are dying from overdoses every year, and unborn children’s lives are being put at risk. Shawn Bishop, a resident at Hope House (an addiction treatment center in Boston) who is just one of two million, became addicted after a prescription of opioids from his dentist. Most people started abusing opioids after getting a prescription from their doctor or dentist as well. If opioids are so dangerous, then why do doctors, dentists, and clinics continue to prescribe them?

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America is in the midst of an epidemic that is growing at an exponential rate: opioid addiction. Despite laws and regulations, the use and abuse of opioids is increasing at an alarming rate, raising the death toll with it. America’s opioid epidemic affects the the lives of roughly two million citizens and counting each year. Contrary to past popular belief, Doctors and pharmaceutical corporations are among the largest distributors of opioid substances and deadly narcotics. Painkillers prescribed by doctors are some of the most addictive and deadly substances in the narcotic industry.

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According to Michael Klein, “The most prescription drugs that are commonly misused are opioids, tranquillizers, sedatives, and hypnotics.” Unintentional overdose deaths involving opioid pain relievers have quadrupled since 1999 and have outnumbered those involving heroin and cocaine since 2002. (Klein). The reason some people abuse opioids is just to “get high”.

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