Beyond walls: Let’s solve addiction before we raise another generation of broken adults

Sign Up For Our FREE Daily eNews!


OPINION

THE SOAPBOX

Stand up. Speak up. It’s your turn.


drugsWhile I was running in Manchester the other morning, I couldn’t help but notice the different pieces of debris scattered through the parks and streets surrounding downtown. An empty hypodermic needle package was strewn on the corner of SoapboxWebster and Maple, a cardboard “Homeless, Please Help” sign lay abandoned on Elm, and at every telephone poll I passed there seemed to be a flier for HOPE Recovery with information on where to go to get clean.

An outsider could look at these remnants as evidence of a typical drug problem confined to the “inner city” of Manchester, but as anyone living here knows, the epidemic we are facing is not restricted to the impoverished, mentally ill, or homeless population. The current opioid crisis in New Hampshire extends across all demographics. I can almost guarantee that anyone reading this article has been impacted in some way – no matter your age, race or neighborhood. And as Mayor Gatsas said recently, “If it hasn’t affected you yet, it will.”

During the current Presidential Election, New Hampshire has shined brightly in the political spotlight due to our status as the First in the Nation Primary. A recent WMUR Poll shows New Hampshire residents feel that drug abuse is the most important problem facing the state, and this has been reflected in the way the candidates from both parties have talked about the issue.

Screen Shot 2016-02-26 at 6.35.49 AM“I did not expect that I would hear about drug abuse everywhere I went,” Democrat Hillary Clinton said at a New Hampshire event over the summer, before revealing her $10 billion plan to address the opioid epidemic in an editorial for the Union Leader in September.

“This disease knows no bounds, knows no income, knows no neighborhood, it’s everywhere,” said Republican John Kasich at the New Hampshire Forum on Addiction in January. Presidential hopefuls, Chris Christie, Jeb Bush, and Carly Fiorina, who have all since dropped out of the race, also shared stories about how the drug epidemic has impacted them personally.

Overall, the discourse has been noticeably more compassionate compared to how politicians of the past talked about drugs. Addiction is now being described as a disease requiring rehabilitation and treatment, rather than a criminal act that should be punished through imprisonment. This humane approach with a focus on decriminalization is a welcome one in New Hampshire, however the candidates have varied ideas on how to actually solve the problem.

Screen Shot 2016-02-26 at 6.35.00 AM


Recently, two frontrunners of the Republican Party, Donald Trump and Ted Cruz, both addressed how they would each solve the opioid crisis. Both of their plans focus on securing the borders with Mexico.

Trump’s solution to the problem lies in his notorious wall. “Heroin is pouring across. It comes through the border,” he said at a New Hampshire rally in January. “We’re going to build a wall, number one. We’re going to build a wall, and it’s going to be a real wall.”

Screen Shot 2016-02-26 at 6.34.47 AMCruz’s solution to the problem echoes Trump’s in many ways. “When the border’s not secure you have drugs flooding into this country,” Cruz said at an event in New Hampshire earlier this month, where he also discussed the overdose death of his half-sister. “Sadly, stopping the drug traffic gets de-emphasized because [Democrat’s] policy view instead is to open the borders to illegal immigration.”

At this same event, Cruz encouraged those struggling with addiction to “have faith” and turn to faith-based institutions for help, like his father did when battling addiction.

Before I go on, let me make one thing clear: I will listen to any suggestion by any candidate about how to solve the opioid crisis in New Hampshire and beyond, because I want to see an end to the suffering caused by the disease of addiction. I have focused intently on this issue in the current presidential election and I have been truly impressed with how many of the candidates – both Democrats and Republicans – have addressed the problem. That being said, frankly I cannot fathom more skewed or senseless logic than the words spewed from Trump or Cruz. Let me explain…

Screen Shot 2016-02-26 at 6.36.05 AMFirst off, to look at the problem as specifically heroin is inaccurate and narrow-minded. This issue spans across all opioids, many of which are produced by the pharmaceutical industry here in the United States. It infuriates me to realize that the big drug companies who produce OxyContin, Percocet, Vicodin and other prescription opiates have played an immense part in the crisis at hand. Due to a lack of awareness on the addictive qualities of these drugs, doctors have over-prescribed and patients have over-medicated. According to a recent Boston Globe articlethe number of prescription painkillers sold in the United States has nearly quadrupled since 1999. In the same time period, overdose deaths have risen by more than 300 percent.

These statistics are no coincidence. While heroin is the problem talked about in the media, the truth is that there are three times as many Americans who are hooked on prescription opioids than heroin alone. Whether these pills are used for medical purposes or recreationally, once someone becomes addicted, it does not take long before heroin – a much cheaper and more potent form of the same drug – seems like the best option for getting high.

Screen Shot 2016-02-26 at 6.35.56 AMAs a recovering addict close to me once told me, “No junkie starts off thinking they’ll shoot heroin someday – you just refuse to accept that it could ever get that bad. I snorted Percocet at a party while I was in high school. I had no idea it was so addictive. But once the drug takes over your mind, you realize heroin is the cheapest and most effective way to get your fix.”

It’s clear from the statistics as well as the stories of people who have grappled with opioid addiction firsthand that this is a disease that will consume your life and potentially kill you. Nobody sets out to become a heroin addict, but the brain’s craving for opioids is so powerful that a person will do almost anything to get high.

Therefore, even if the Trump/Cruz concept of securing the border does work and the illicit heroin does stop entering the U.S., we will be left with a country full of struggling opioid addicts who are still looking for their next fix. How do these politicians lack the foresight to see that as long as prescription opioid medications continue to be manufactured and distributed within our own borders, many of these addicts will simply turn back to this more expensive version of the same drug?

To promote their own racially-charged ideologies, Donald Trump and Ted Cruz are blaming the Mexicans for a problem that is in many ways homegrown. Instead of looking into new forms of treatment to help those who are already struggling, or investing in education and prevention strategies to make sure future generations do not misuse opioids down the road, these men are spouting simplistic solutions to a problem that will not go away by closing the border.

As I said before, this election has given me hope that many politicians do care about ending the opioid epidemic and have demonstrated their resolve by putting forth plans to help those who have already been impacted by the disease, as well as preventing more addiction in the future.

Screen Shot 2016-02-26 at 6.35.09 AMHowever, I still wonder why there is little discussion about the tremendous role pharmaceutical companies have played in this epidemic. In fact, only Democrat Bernie Sanders has pointed a finger. “There is a responsibility on the part of the pharmaceutical industry and the drug companies who are producing all of these drugs and not looking at the consequence of it,” he said at a recent Democratic debate.

I believe there is still more that can be done to hold the pharmaceutical industry accountable for the perils of these drugs they have over-produced and over-marketed for the past two decades. If these companies returned a fraction of the profits they’ve made on prescription opiates, maybe we could finally build enough treatment facilities to help all of the addicts who want to get clean but don’t have the means available to them.

There is also a need for the federal, state and local governments to step up and fund more treatment programs. In New Hampshire alone there are nowhere near enough beds for the thousands of people plagued by the disease of addiction who are looking to get help in a rehabilitation setting. It becomes especially frustrating when you remember that it was our government and the policies they put in place that helped to create this problem in the first place by not holding the pharmaceutical companies to a higher standard on how they test, produce, and market these incredibly addictive drugs.

Screen Shot 2016-02-26 at 6.35.32 AMWe also need to remember that 2 out of 3 opioid addicts experienced some type of severe childhood trauma. As a society, we need to work together to find new solutions to help make sure that a new generation of children do not grow into broken adults, who feel the need to turn to opioids to cope. This can be aided by continuing to demystify therapy and other healthy mechanisms that focus on healing the individual, instead of overmedicating them.

This is a problem that can’t be fixed overnight, and maybe not in the next presidency, but if a 24 year old from New Hampshire can understand and explain some of the basic issues connected to this crisis, we need to expect the leaders of our country to do so also, instead of sticking to narrow-minded pipe dreams for their own political benefit.

This isn’t a partisan issue. This is a common sense issue. And it is also an issue of life or death for the millions of Americans struggling with opioid dependence.

What do you say to that Mr. Trump and Mr. Cruz?


email boxYou’re one click away! Sign up for our free eNewsletter and never miss another thing.


Rebecca HowardRebecca Howard is a Manchester native and a first-year graduate student at UNH working toward her master’s in Justice Studies. She is especially passionate about social justice reform in the American governmental system. In her spare time she enjoys running, cooking, and binge-watching crime shows on Netflix.

 


Beg to differ? Agree to disagree? Got something you really need to say? Submissions to The Soapbox should be sent to robidouxnews@gmail.commailto:robidouxnews@gmail.com, subject line: The Soapbox.

About this Author

Carol Robidoux

PublisherManchester Ink Link

Longtime NH journalist and publisher of ManchesterInkLink.com. Loves R&B, German beer, and the Queen City!