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The Heroin Epidemic, Heroin use has skyrocketed in the U.S., it's hitting young adult

PriestTheyCalledHim

PriestTheyCalledHim

Bluelighter
Joined
Oct 7, 2005
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US News and World Report said:
The White House released a plan this week to pour $5 million into combating heroin use and trafficking. The plan followed months of warnings from the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention about the explosion in heroin use in the U.S.

Presidential candidates have also spoken out on the issue. Hillary Clinton has called the heroin and methamphetamine addiction a "quiet epidemic" and held roundtables to discuss the issue with voters. Rand Paul has spoken repeatedly about the racial aspect of the war on drugs and said that he would change minimum sentencing laws if elected. Chris Christie has enacted reforms in his home state of New Jersey, saying he favored treatment instead of imprisonment, and calling drug addiction a disease that "can happen to anyone from any station in life."

In the last decade, heroin abuse has skyrocketed. The rate of heroin-related overdose deaths increased 286 percent between 2002 and 2013 . In 2002, 100 people per 100,000 were addicted to heroin but that number had doubled by 2013.

The CDC says males, non-hispanic whites, 18- to 25-year-olds and people living in large metropolitan areas are at the most risk for heroin addiction, which covers most of the U.S. Heroin addiction spans all ages, races, genders, incomes, insurance statuses and locations.

The problem of substance abuse touches many areas of public policy, from border security to the health system and criminal justice. The rise may have been spurred partially by an increase in supply: the amount of heroin seized at the border with Mexico quadrupled by 2013 from the 2000s, making the drug cheaper in the U.S. and more pure. During 2008-2011, there were about 1.1 million emergency department visits for drug poisoning each year, or 35.4 visits per 10,000 people.

Abuse has increased most drastically in the Midwest.

Who Abuses Heroin?

The average user of heroin has changed drastically in the last decade. In 2000, black Americans aged 45-64 had the highest death rate for drug poisoning involving heroin. Now, white people aged 18-44 have the highest rate. The share of people who say they have used heroin in the past year is actually decreasing for non-whites. Heroin has taken hold of the white suburbs, which has prompted more attention for what is now being called a " health problem."

The heroin epidemic is hitting young adults more than other age groups. The use among Americans aged 18-25 increased 109 percent from 2002-2004 and 2011-2013. For Americans 26 and older, it increased 58 percent.
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Full article with charts and data:
http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/data-mine/2015/08/19/the-heroin-epidemic-in-9-graphs
 
My own life experience reflects these findings. I hope more help and humane treatment for all addicted people come to be.
 
5 million? Is that a typo? Lol

Wouldn't even put a dent in the trade
 
Coincidence this epidemic started when the DEA went after the prescription pill problem, huh? No doubt in my mind they fully expected this as sending people with big guns to foreign countries to battle the evil drug lords is a lot splashier media coverage than some doctor overprescribing. That and its easier to prosecute those with a schedule I drug.
 
When heroin started to crawl into the suburbs and white people started getting hooked, then IT'S AN EPIDEMIC. As far as I know rates of opiate addiction have remained mostly steady over the decades; according to my lazy googling, the rate of heroin addiction in the United States only increased from 0.16% to 0.25% from 1999 to 2014 (actual deaths from opiate use increased more significantly but that's a separate but related issue...)...it's just that no one gave a shit when the victims were poor people shooting up in the ghetto 8)

Just the flavor of the moment. In the 60's it was LSD, in the 70's PCP, the 80s it was crack, the 90's it was meth, now it's back to heroin. Yawn.
 
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$5 million? I bet it all goes to fighting trafficking and not helping addicts. Throwing $5 million at an industry worth many billions (profit from illegal sale, and the amount of money funding prohibition) is going to do next to nothing.

It is sad that during the eighties when crack was huge the DEA just wanted to arrest poor black people (why having crack was a harsher jail sentence than powder cocaine) and now they are viewing the heroin as an epidemic. I am guessing the next "epidemic" is going to be cocaine again, or some other stimulant.
 
I am pretty sure meth will make a comeback. They are going to come up with some new formulation that is supposedly "Way more dangerous of an epidemic scale."
 
Captain.Heroin said:
Mark my words: meth will make a comeback.
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Agreed. Though meth hasn't really gone anywhere. The production model just changed. Instead of small labs and regional suppliers it's ran across the border from super labs in mexico.
 
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I live in cali and rural cali. I smoke weed daily and i roll and trip on weekends. Meth sure seems like its the flavor currently though i dont parttake.
 
There's a lot of meth out in the American West. There are pounds of it out where I live (and I live in an area that's about as rural as you can possibly get)
 
Burnt Offerings said:
There's a lot of meth out in the American West. There are pounds of it out where I live (and I live in an area that's about as rural as you can possibly get)
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Meth is everywhere. I lived out west and there was a lot of it or people who used it were extremely open about using it, by going out into public tweaked, and smoking it in public on the street or while driving; but opiates were actually more popular and more in demand.

I've also lived in the middle of nowhere in a rural area on the East Coast and meth was also there; but opiates in general were more popular there, and for awhile people would just buy Adderall/Dexedrine off of people who had a prescription for it if they could not find meth or coke.
 
Kittycat5 said:
Coincidence this epidemic started when the DEA went after the prescription pill problem, huh? No doubt in my mind they fully expected this as sending people with big guns to foreign countries to battle the evil drug lords is a lot splashier media coverage than some doctor overprescribing. That and its easier to prosecute those with a schedule I drug.
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People were literally screaming at the top of their lungs years ago that cracking down on Rx opioids shall result in a Heroin epidemic.

Unfortunately, when you try to reason with a government agency which seemingly cannot tell whether Marijuana consumption presents less of an acute and/or long term health risk to the user compared to Diacetylmorphine (Heroin), it's not difficult to realize that the mere presence of these idiots where you happen to reside is more of a danger to your existence than the list of certain/some drugs they don't want to see you in possession of.

How the DEA continues to exist after 4+ decades of pure, unadulterated failure costing in excess of $1,000,000,000,000 USD in tax payer money makes as much sense as Tommy "You are tearing me apart Lisa; oh, hi Mark!" Wiseau's film 'The Room' achieving cult status.
 
ro4eva said:
People were literally screaming at the top of their lungs years ago that cracking down on Rx opioids shall result in a Heroin epidemic.

Unfortunately, when you try to reason with a government agency which seemingly cannot tell whether Marijuana consumption presents less of an acute and/or long term health risk to the user compared to Diacetylmorphine (Heroin), it's not difficult to realize that the mere presence of these idiots where you happen to reside is more of a danger to your existence than the list of certain/some drugs they don't want to see you in possession of.

How the DEA continues to exist after 4+ decades of pure, unadulterated failure costing in excess of $1,000,000,000,000 USD in tax payer money makes as much sense as Tommy "You are tearing me apart Lisa; oh, hi Mark!" Wiseau's film 'The Room' achieving cult status.
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Yep! People on bluelight where predicting a heroin epidemic as far back as 2008. Anyone with a brain saw this coming once the reformulated oxys hit the market. It seems to me that the government has more or less written off everyone currently addicted as lost causes. They figure the best way to stop the epidemic is to stop people from trying opiates in the first place. That's where this movement to restrict opiate scripts written by general practitioners and dentists is coming from. This strategy makes some sense if you think about it because the treatment for opiate addictions is different than treatment for other kind of drug addictions. Its more expensive and requires the use of medications administered by highly trained clinicians. In other words expensive. Where as alcoholics are simply detoxed and sent to AA to be treated for free.

Basically they have decided that the best way to control this epidemic is too let it burn itself out. As users die or go to prison the crisis will subside. Just my perspective
 
ppl who wanna be high will always find a way

This is ridiculous. Ppl who want to be high will always find a way to be high. Hence how meth was born.the Midwest found it harder to get cocaine and heroine in from coastlines so what did they do? They wen out back and literally created their own drug. The war on drugs is a joke ppl are adults and will do what they want we live in this risk policed society that sickens me!!! I'll take opiates/dope til the day I die and father be dead if i couldn't. Anyone who has to live in chronic pain would agree. The united States makes me sick were wasting so much money when all of our money should be going into education and healthcare not drug prevention. Hello by helping ppl be educated and their health being cared for wont reduce drug use but it will reduce and prevent crime related to drug use! Duh.
 
Uak143 said:
This is ridiculous. Ppl who want to be high will always find a way to be high. Hence how meth was born.the Midwest found it harder to get cocaine and heroine in from coastlines so what did they do? They wen out back and literally created their own drug.

^^ Actually, meth was originally created in a lab meant to become a new prescription drug.
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ticklethepeach said:
Uak143 said:
This is ridiculous. Ppl who want to be high will always find a way to be high. Hence how meth was born.the Midwest found it harder to get cocaine and heroine in from coastlines so what did they do? They wen out back and literally created their own drug.

^^ Actually, meth was originally created in a lab meant to become a new prescription drug.
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Wasn't it invented by a Romanian chemist (or was that Dextro)?
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