So, what exactly is Alcoholics Anonymous, and what does it do as an organization? A.A. was first fueled by its many volunteers of men and women from all walks of life worldwide. Whether active-duty military, veterans, white-collar, blue-collar, middle class, homeless, young or old, black, white, brown, yellow, or red, the organization accepts anyone who wants to change their behavior. One of the criteria for being a member is that the alcoholic must have the desire to stop drinking. The individual must be willing to change the behavior. Legal, marital, and job issues have forced the person to attend a weekly meeting.

In this organization, there are not fees or dues as it is estimated that there are over 120,000 groups and over 2,000,000 members in approximately 180 countries. A.A. is a peer support group not affiliated with any religious organization and is led by former alcoholics. To lead the group, the chairperson may be sober for more than six months with another sober alcoholic nearby for assistance in guiding the group. A.A. groups are fully supported by donations from its members and non-group members. A.A. program model is an initiative of total abstinence. Staying sober is accomplished by sharing struggles, stories, and testimonies at regular group meetings.

Are You Ready to Change?

Founded in June 1935 by a New York stockbroker and an Ohio surgeon, both alcoholics themselves, the organization has grown to assist other individuals who are broken, hurt, and have a sense of “hopelessness” to overcome and persevere from the disease of alcoholism and to help their fellow man who also struggles, Kurtz, E. (2010) as one of the men stated that hot June night, “I just do not anything to drink.”

Anyone looking to be free from the addiction of alcoholism can attend a local A.A. support group meeting in their city. Those who walk through the doors are never judged based on their history, never looked down upon, and never turned away. A.A. will not solicit anyone to become a member; it is strictly up to the individual; it will not provide detox, nursing or rehabilitation services, or hospitalization on the premises. Neither does the organization provide housing, food, clothing, money, or any other social servicing. A.A. provides a safe place to be yourself, share your story, and be embraced and accepted by your peers.

For more information for yourself, a friend or a family member please visit https://www.aa.org

Reference:

Kurtz, E. (2010). Not god: A history of Alcoholics Anonymous. Simon and Schuster.

Alcohol can be a hazardous legal substance in the United States if consumption is more than the legal limit, as evidenced by deaths resulting from drunk driving, domestic abuse, homelessness due to loss of jobs and other income, jail time, and long-term chronic disease. When a person with an addiction reaches the level of dependency, that individual is in a very, very dark place, which makes recovery all the more difficult. I have seen firsthand how alcohol addiction can disrupt a family structure to the core, bringing about trauma, anger, and bitterness.

Unfortunately, I grew up in a family of alcoholics. As a young boy, I was told, “You are going to be just like your father, a drunk.” My grandfather drank, my dad drank, my uncles drank, my brothers drank, and I drank. It seemed to be the norm in my family. I remember going to family functions in North Carolina and South Carolina as a child and seeing the male members of my family slip away around the corner, knowing they were doing something they did not want others to see, like drinking.

Are You Ready to Change?

This article will address the needs of the alcoholic through a community-based program called Alcoholics Anonymous or A.A. I doubt seriously that many of my male family members, if any, attended a 12-step support group to deal with their issues in the 70s and 80s. Back then, in the black community, many people felt that support groups, counseling, or therapy were for weak-minded individuals and would not attend unless they were in jeopardy of losing something. However, I can say that my father and an older brother participated in a local A.A. meeting and, to some degree, helped a little.

For my father, an Amry veteran, a recovery support treatment facility saved him from his deathbed. However, he later died of lung cancer, having smoked most of his life, and cirrhosis of the liver due to alcoholism. My brother, who attended meetings due to recommendations from his job, eventually lost his job, continued drinking, and is now in a treatment facility with loss of memory due to alcoholism. For a person with substance use disorder to change, there must be a willingness to change. A.A. is a tool and resource to help those who want to change even though they may relapse several times. A.A. has a saying at the end of their meetings, “It works if you keep coming back.” Hopefully, this article will show the strengths and the solid foundation of working steps towards recovery and understanding the principles.

For more information for yourself, a friend or a family member please visit https://www.aa.org

It is no secret that America has had a heroin problem for decades, dating back to the Vietnam era. It is also no secret that America has an opioid problem as well. It appears that doctors were overprescribing, and in 2010, authorities began cracking down on those doctors prescribing opioids. Those now addicted to the painkillers still needed their “fix,” so the actual national problem became an epidemic. As a result, when the patient’s prescriptions ran out, their opioid of choice became heroin.

Now we have a problem. It is no longer a criminal justice issue but a public health issue, even affecting Native Americans at a high level. How can a person with an addiction find help? How can family and friends support people with an addiction? What can treatment centers do to curb this public health issue? It seems that opioid prescriptions are going down with doctors’ awareness of the problem. Addiction is a treatable medical addiction like any other illness. However, treatment must be given to the person with an addiction for his or her addiction as well as their mental health diagnosis.

Are You Ready to Change?

“Treatment for co-occurring disorders must be long-term and address the specific problems the person with an addiction is dealing with. The purpose is for the person with an addiction to heal and to have a full recovery” (Doweiko, 2015). Finally, there are so many ways we can be involved in decreasing the amount of substance abuse and drug dependency in our culture, and it starts at the top. With the help of the federal government and the president’s commission on drug abuse, the public school system across the nation, churches, and non-profits, it is possible that families with people with an addiction can be healed. Identifying at-risk juveniles in the criminal court system, having effective drug residential programs, and intensive outpatient services is a great way to start the healing process towards reducing a growing drug epidemic among American citizens who feel trapped.

If you ask anyone familiar with the drug OxyContin, they will tell you that Purdue Pharma was the culprit distributor behind the scene.Billions of dollars were made in profits as legal prescriptions increased from 600,000 at the end of the 20th century to over 6 million by the early 2000s. Also, the death rate increased as many lives were destroyed and homes were broken. An $ 8.3 billion lawsuit was filed against this company for its role in this awful epidemic. Other companies were also sued for their role in distributing the drug, such as AmerisourceBergen, which was sued for $6.4 billion; Cardinal Health for $6.4 billion; and McKesson for $7.9 billion. However, no amount of money can ever bring back a stolen life. People are crying for help to be delivered from this place of darkness. They have lost hope and a desire to live and see no way out of their situation.

For more information for yourself, a friend or a family member please visit https://na.org/

Reference:

Doweiko, H. E. (2015). Concepts of chemical dependency (9th ed.). Stamford, CT: Cengage Learning.

Wow, there are so many adverse effects to using opioids, from OxyContin, Percocet, and heroin, to name a few. To begin with, the states with the most significant numbers of opioid abusers are California, New York, Massachusetts, and New Jersey (Doweiko, 2015). But we know that all of North America is in an opioid crisis as we speak. Sadly, within the last 20 years, nearly 500,000 people have succumbed to opioid overdoses. Many who are addicted do not think they can live to reach 30 years old or even 40 years old.

Those who are addicted do not want to live the way they do. It’s a sickness and a disease. Opioids do affect the brain of the user by depressing the breathing of an individual, affecting the blood pressure and their ability to be alert at times. When someone overdoses on an opioid or any drug for that matter, it appears that part of the brain function that tells the lungs to breathe turns off. Many have overdosed and came close to death but did not die. Another adverse effect of substance abuse and dependency may lead to a depressive state of mind, and the individual can be diagnosed with a co-occurring disorder.

Are You Ready to Change?

Drug abuse, in general, affects so many aspects of life, from the individual to the family, employment, finances, health care, and the criminal system. It seems as though the “war on drugs” in the past has targeted ethnic minorities and people experiencing poverty. So, it seemed that law enforcement authorities and local governments as a whole viewed drug addiction as a crime, especially in urban communities. When the crack epidemic hit metropolitan cities, many law enforcement communities may have viewed it as a criminal act instead of an addiction that needed to be treated initially. And to be fair, it was a criminal act to those who sold and to those who used it because crack was something new to the seen.

Nonetheless, when the opioid addiction came on the scene in the 21^st century, it was not so much considered a criminal act as crack, but more of an illness that needed to be addressed. With the crack epidemic, again, mainly targeted the poor and African American communities, while drugs such as OxyContin, Percocet, and other pills targeted the poor and primarily white suburban culture in well-to-do communities and rural areas. So, the deficiency of the ability to talk about African American overdose deaths in the national opioid discourse continues to marginalize black people and seems consistent with a history of framing the addictions of people of color as deserving of criminal punishment rather than worthy of medical treatment (James, K. et al., 2018).

For more information for yourself, a friend or a family member please visit https://na.org/

References:

Doweiko, H. E. (2015). Concepts of chemical dependency (9th ed.). Stamford, CT: Cengage Learning.

James, K., & Jordan, A. (2018). The opioid crisis in black communities. Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics, 46(2), 404-421.

In 1996, it appeared that one of the top distributors of the unforeseen opioid epidemic was a company called Purdue Pharma, and it also appeared to be one of the biggest in the U.S. Purdue Pharma took the lead in distributing this new drug called OxyContin in the mid to late 1990s and from a marketing standpoint did very well in marketing to consumers across America. The excessive visibility of the drug OxyContin about the rise of increased abuse and substance abuse by the early to mid-2000s, this drug had become one of the leading drugs of abuse in our country. However, researchers of the pill stated that it would be safe to take and that patients would not become addicted to taking them. Later, we know how that story ends.

Sales representatives working for the company were given huge bonuses for the sales made in their respective areas. As a result, there was a vast number of doctor visits to physicians with seemingly high rates of opioid prescriptions across the nation. This was the financial outcome for their workforce. In 2001, the average sales representative’s yearly income was just over $50,000, and annual bonuses were given around $70,000 per salesperson, ranging from $20,000 to over $200,000. However, because of the damage Purdue Pharma has done to society in their participation in selling this drug, the company has agreed to stop promoting OxyContin to U.S. doctors (Whalen, J. 2018). We will see why later in this blog.

Are You Ready to Change?

But the damage done may have already been too late. Today over 2 million individuals struggle with some type of chemical addiction in the U. S., and an estimated 260 million prescriptions for opioids are written yearly by physicians. So, could the physicians writing these legal prescriptions be the “drug dealer” unknowingly to so many? Purdue Pharma was certainly not the only company distributing an opioid drug. Other big-name pharma companies such as AmerisourceBergen, Cardinal Health, and McKesson have been in distribution in the past two decades. The opioid epidemic has destroyed millions of lives and has also devastated our economy greatly. “Drug treatment is costly, and the sad part is that only 1 in 10 addicts get the help they need to survive, and only 1 in 3 addicts have no adequate health insurance and no way to pay for any treatment” (Mojtabai, R. et al., 2005-2018). Next, we will look at how this crisis has affected our culture and some of the adverse effects that go along with it.

For more information for yourself, a friend or a family member please visit https://na.org/

References:

Mojtabai, R., Mauro, C., Wall, M. M., Barry, C. L., & Olfson, M. (2020). Private health insurance coverage of drug use disorder treatment: 2005–2018. 

Whalen, J. (2018). Purdue Pharma to stop promoting OxyContin to US doctors. The Wall Street Journal.

Opioid addiction has taken America by storm. To date, it is currently the most dangerous drug available and readily accessible to almost anyone. This drug does not discriminate at all and has destroyed the lives of the wealthy, the poor, black, white, brown, educated, uneducated, famous, and ordinary individuals alike. What can governmental officials, rehab treatment centers, and hospitals do, if anything, to decrease and control this addiction to opioids that is bringing America to a standstill? This blog will address several factors: how and when this epidemic began, who its top distributors are, what the negative results of using are, and how this situation can end.

How Did This Epidemic of Opioids Begin

To begin with, opioid addiction started its inception in the early 1990s. Physicians at that time and in the past considered opioids to be dangerous to society and hesitated to write prescriptions that would lead to overdosing. However, around 1996, a company called Purdue Pharma, a privately held pharmaceutical company based out of Stamford, CT., released a new drug by the name of OxyContin, which was marketed to be safe and not addictive to those whom their researchers prescribed it. But as a result, the profit from the sales of the pill went through the roof, and so did addictive behaviors, overdoses, and even the death rate. Sales grew from $48 million in 1996 to almost $1.1 billion in 2000 and were indeed a commercial success as they related to profit, but also a public health tragedy.

“Initiative, this new “wonder drug” could, with one dose, relieve pain for the subsequent 12 hours, which was over twice of the existing drugs on the market that had palliative pain for 4-6 hours” (Chow, R. 2019). As society needed painkillers for different reasons, people began to build a tolerance for OxyContin and other pain-killing medications such as Percocet. So, it appeared that the more opioid prescription pain medications that were available, the more society wanted. And wanting more of this drug somehow began the cycle of addiction. However, everyone who suffered from pain after surgery or who was dealing with pain in general did not get hooked, but for some, it was the beginning of an addiction.

Are You Ready to Change?

Now that our culture was craving more prescription drugs like OxyContin and Percocet, and big pharma companies and doctors who were willing to write prescriptions, it then led to a drug called heroin made from morphine, which has been around for years. “Today, it is noted that the narcotic drug heroin makes up for 71% of opiate substance use around the world, and globally, it has been estimated that 15.6 million people either abuse or are addicted to heroin” (Doweiko, 2015). According to the National Center on Health Statistics, 43% of individuals are addicted to various prescription medications, 24% of people are addicted to heroin, 18% are addicted to a drug called Benzodiazepine, and 12% of people are addicted to cocaine. The excellent news about opioid addiction is that it is treatable. There are 23 million people in treatment recovery, but one question remains. Who were or are the top distributors of opioid drugs, and what was their objective in prescribing these pills?

For more information for yourself, a friend or a family member please visit https://na.org/

References:

Chow, R. (2019). Purdue Pharma and OxyContin–A Commercial Success But Public Health Disaster. Harvard Public Health Review, 25.

Doweiko, H. E. (2015). Concepts of chemical dependency (9th ed.). Stamford, CT: Cengage Learning.

Substance abuse and dependency in America is a tremendous tragedy dating back to the beginning of the earlier settlers in the “New World,” costing millions of dollars in recovery and rehabilitation today. Mental health itself in America seems to be increasing more and more in dealing with a global pandemic, high gas prices, a fragile economy, anxiety, and so much uncertainty. Now, combine both substance abuse and mental illness together, and what we have in our nation is chaos.

We are living in a world today like none other, and as time goes on, it may only get worse. For those who are struggling with substance use and mental illness, there appear to be some common characteristics with this population, such as loneliness, anxiety, boredom, and isolation. “Unfortunately, with mental illness and substance abuse, dual diagnosis disorders that these men and women display are bipolar disorders, generalized anxiety disorders, schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorders, major depression, personality disorders, and pathological gambling” (Van Wormer, K. et al., 2018).

Are You Ready to Change?

 So, what can mental health professionals, counselors, pastors, and community leaders do to decrease comorbidity/dual diagnosis in people with an addiction? It appears America has been fighting the war on drugs for decades now, and it seems like the drugs are winning. Laws are passed to deter the behavior, yet more private prisons appear to be being built. However, the rules are being broken, and the prison system seems to be overflowing with those who have an addiction. “More than half of all prison and jail inmates were found to have a mental health problem, and over 70% of these individuals have a co-occurring substance use disorder” (Van Wormer et al., 2018).

What are the obstacles involved in the treatment and recovery process of clients with dual diagnoses, and who can we blame? Healthcare insurance companies or lack of healthcare protection for people with an addiction, available resources in the community for those who have no transportation, and the amount of “red tape” from city, county, and state governments and politicians who appear to be on board to help with recovery yet let so many slip through the cracks.

References:

Jackson, Chris. “Drug Addiction-to-Recovery Trajectories in British Sociocultural and Political Contexts: A

Synthetic Discursive Exploration.” https://core.ac.uk/download/327948675.pdf.

Van Wormer, K., and Davis, D.R. (2018) Addiction Treatment. New York