When I think of New England, I don't naturally conjure up an image of heroin. Yet today, many cities and towns in the bucolic northeast are facing a heroin epidemic. Clearly at odds with the image of the Atlantic Ocean lapping at seaside resorts, Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire and Massachusetts are each seeing disturbing trends. Illustrating the magnitude of the problem engulfing his state, Vermont's Governor Pete Shumlin devoted his entire 2014 State of the State address to what he called "a full blown heroin crisis."
Across the country too, heroin death are skyrocketing: According to the Centers for Disease Control, more than 8,000 Americans died of heroin-related overdoses in 2013 - nearly three times as many as those who died in 2010.
So what's fueling the explosion of heroin use? Stanford addiction expert Keith Humphreys, PhD, told me in this 1:2:1 podcast that it's largely propelled by the huge number of prescriptions for opioid pain killers. According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, more than 2 million Americans abuse prescription pain killers - and Humphreys says when the pills run out, many turn to heroin as a cheaper alternative and an equivalent high.
Recognizing the rippling toll on communities and families across the nation, the Obama administration announced a new program in August to combat the trafficking and use of the drug. The Washington Post first reported the plan, saying that the initiative will pair public health officials and law enforcement in an effort to shift the emphasis from punishment to the treatment of addicts.
After hearing the heroin crisis also popping up in conversations from several presidential candidates during their jaunts to New Hampshire, I turned to Humphreys to dig deeper into the issue. In addition to being a professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford, Humpreys also spent a year in the White House Office of Drug Policy as a senior policy advisor during the first year of the Obama administration.
Previously: Assessing the opioid overdose epidemic, A focus on addiction, the country's leading cause of accidental death, Why doctors prescribe opioids to patients they know are abusing them and Do opium and opioids increase mortality risk?
Photo by Lauri Rantala
