Drinking Surged During The Pandemic; Warning Signs For Problems

Drinking Surged During The Pandemic.  Do You Know The Signs Of Addiction?  by KCUR.  Kaiser Health News.  June 24, 2020.

Aspiring Doctors Seek Advanced Training In Addiction Medicine

Aspiring Doctors Seek Advanced Training In Addiction Medicine by Will Stone.  California Healthline.  March 22, 2019. 

Mother's Role In The Treatment Of Opioid-Dependent Newborns

A Tide Of Opioid-Dependent Newborns Forces Doctors To Rethink Treatment by Catherine Satint Louis  July 14, 2017. 

Drugs Versus Psychosocial Treatments? Trump Choice Highlights Rift

Trump's Pick For Mental Health 'Czar' Highlights Rift by Benedict Carey and Sheri Fink.  New York Times.  May 24, 2017. 

Heroin Use Increased Fivefold In The Last Decade

US Heroin Use Has Increased Almost Fivefold In A Decade, Study Shows by Nicola Davis.  The Guardian.  March 29, 2017

Personality Testing Can Identify 90 Percent Of Children With High Risk Of Drug Addiction

The 4 Traits That Put Kids At Risk For Addiction by Maia Szalavitz.  The New York Times.  September 29, 2016.

Surgical Innovation In Addiction Treatment Requires New Skills And Facilities

New Addiction Treatment Brings New System For Doctors To Navigate by Karen Shakerdge.  Side Effects.  July 11, 2016.

How Doctors Helped Drive The Addiction Crisis

How Doctors Helped Drive The Addiction Crisis by Richard A. Friedman.  The New York Times.  November 7, 2015

Addiction As Adaptation; Cure As Social

The Likely Cause Of Addiction Has Been Discovered And Its Not What You Think by Johann Hari.  Huffington Post.  January 23, 2015.

Gambling As A Public Health Issue

Gambling With America's Health by Elaine Meyer.  Pacific Standard.  September 15, 2014.

A Different Path To Fighting Addiction

A Different Path To Fighting Addiction by Gabrielle Glaser.  The New York Times.  July 3, 2014.

Possible Molecular Therapy For Drug Addiction Identified

New Form Of Brain Signaling Affects Addiction-Related Behavior.  Science Daily.  June 27, 2014.

Prisoner Sign-Ups Under the Affordable Care Act

Little-Known Health Act Fact:  Prison Inmates Are Signing Up by Erica Goode.  The New York Times.  March 9, 2014.

Since prisoners have a "disproportionately high rates of chronic diseases, especially mental illness and addictive disorders," coverage can benefit prisoners while in prison and when they are released.  State and local governments are finding that they can save money for health care by enrolling prisoners.

Heroin Makes A Comeback Via OxyContin And Vicodin

OxyCotin A Gateway To Heroin For Upper-Income Addicts by Donna Leinwand Leger.  USA TODAY.  April 25, 2013.

The article states that "lawyers, nurses, cops and ministers" are showing up to receive treatment for heroin addiction, an addiction that often begins with prescription painkillers.

10 Years In Prison For Young Georgia Woman: A Tale Of Prisons and Mental Health

A Question of Justice by Bill Rankin and Carrie Teegardin.  The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.  February 15, 2013.  (Available in print and digital subscription).

While the emphasis of the article is on the prison system and mandatory incarceration, the story of Sarah Page Dukes essentially tells the story of how a person with a mental health/drug addiction problem ended up in prison serving a mandatory 10 year sentence under Georgia's mandatory sentencing law.  An interesting case study of the relationship between the criminal justice and public health systems.

Losing Focus By Seeking It: Tragic Story of Addiction

Drowned In A Stream of Prescriptions by Alan Schwarz.  The New York Times.  February 2, 2013.

The tragic story of Richard Fee, college class president and aspiring medical student, is told in the context of the national problem of abuse of Adderall, an amphetamine-based medication for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.  The article points out that nearly 14 million monthly prescriptions for ADHD were written in 2011, two and a half times what was prescripted in 2007.

Restricting Access To Vicodin: The Right Approach to the Painkiller Epidemic?

FDA Might Tighten Reins On Vicodin by Donna Leinwand Leger.  USA Today.  January 10, 2013.

In light of the burgeoning painkiller epidemic government agencies are weighing steps to restrict access to one of the most popular these drugs, vicodin, a combination of hydrocodone and acetaminophen.  The Drug Enforcement Administration wants the Food and Drug Administration to classify vicodin as a Schedule II drug.  This means that the rules governing doctors writing prescriptions for vicodin would be tightened.  In evaluating this potential schedule change regulators are considering whether this action would in fact restrict access and hence abuse or would merely inconvenience patients.

Pain Killer Restrictions Impact Doctors, Patients, Pharmacists

Making the "Pharmacy Crawl"  by Timothy W. Martin.  The Wall Street Journal.  September 27, 2012.

Key Ideas/Summary.  Several states now make doctors criminally liable and revoke their licenses for writing prescriptions for painkillers that lead to overdoses.  As a result some physicians do not write such prescriptions at all.  These laws arose as a result of the skyrocketing number of deaths by prescription drugs which in 2011 exceeded death from heroin and cocaine combined (Centers for Disease Control).  As a results of restrictive laws some pharmacies have stopped carrying pain-killers or limited their supply, sometimes forcing patients to "crawl" from pharmacy to pharmacy to fill their prescription.