The Attorney General in Alabama has designated a good chunk of its opioid crisis settlement money go towards an impressive cause.  In a series of attempts to right the wrongs that opioids caused the state, Alabama will allocate $1.5 million of their McKinsey & Company settlement to the Department of Child Abuse and Neglect Prevention. …

A recent Biden administration proposal to crack down on opioids is causing quite a stir among criminal and civil justice reform groups. The administration’s new drug policy proposal aims to reduce the supply and availability of illicitly manufactured fentanyl and related substances. However, civil rights groups warn this could have a significant impact on people …

Picture it: There are 100 people standing in front of you. All of them have a substance abuse disorder. You ask them to raise their hand if they started using drugs before the age of 18. 90 hands go up. What does the show of hands prove? Age matters. In fact, it’s a staggering statistic. …

“I just need a way out of my head. I’ll do anything for a way out of my head.” These are the lyrics from Mac Miller’s platinum track “Come Back To Earth.” The song’s album, Swimming, achieved platinum status in February of 2021 – two and a half years after the rapper’s death. It was …

Darknet fentanyl. A 10-month investigation across three continents. Dozens of law enforcement agencies. This was no small operation. And it paid off. After careful coordination among nine countries, operation “Dark HunTor” took 500 pounds of illicit drugs off the market – along with $32 million in cash and 45 firearms. The far-reaching drug enforcement operation …

When does drug use become drug abuse? What does it look like to cross the line from medication to dependency? How can you tell if you or a loved one needs help with opioid addiction? How about we take the guesswork out of it? Mental health professionals look to the DSM-5 for guidance, and we …

I remember when he was five and his biggest concern was getting the latest dinosaur toy. Now Josh is 15, and he’s just so different lately. I don’t expect him to be five anymore, but the changes I’m seeing…I’m concerned. He’s lost interest in soccer, started hanging out with a new crowd, and he’s just …

I used to dread making the 100-mile drive to visit my family for Thanksgiving. I loved the food, but I was always triggered by the company. The anxiety would kick in at least a week before – sometimes two depending on how professionally overwhelmed I was at the time – so I’d head to the …

The opioid epidemic has been raging a deadly war in the United States for over two decades.  In the late 90s, Big Pharma readily reassured doctors that their patients would not become addicted to opioid pain relievers, so they started doling out prescriptions at greater rates than ever before. Unsurprisingly, this led to widespread misuse …

Waiting on a loved one to hit “rock bottom” before getting help for an addiction is not only harmful, it is potentially lethal. While we may have been encouraged to proceed with tough love by not “enabling” a loved one, we can inadvertently push them further into their addiction.  Instead, a more helpful approach would …