‘It’s a real thing’: Experts react to opiate addiction
The opiate overdose crisis is real and it’s not getting any better, with one expert saying the issue has “real world implications.”
Dr. Mark Karpinski, an infectious disease specialist at the University of California San Francisco, said the number of people who use opiates like fentanyl and heroin is on the rise in the U.S. and that it’s becoming a “real thing” in the country.
Karpinski said the opiate epidemic is a national crisis.
“We’re seeing it in California right now, and we’re seeing a huge uptick in the number and the frequency of overdoses,” Karpinsky said.
“We’re also seeing it around the world.
It’s not just one state that’s seeing it.”
The opioid epidemic in the United States has reached a level that, by some estimates, could double the nation’s overdose death toll in a matter of weeks.KARPINKI: Opioid deaths are increasing and we need to think about how to respond to itThe Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has identified that the opioid epidemic is “likely the single most important public health challenge facing the United State,” and a national effort to address it is underway.KAPPA, the National Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and Quality, recently released a report that found the number, number of opioid overdoses and number of deaths from drug overdoses in the US increased in 2016 compared to 2015.
The report noted that a staggering 75 percent of the increases were due to an increase in the prevalence of the use of synthetic opioids like fentanyl, oxycodone and methadone.
The CDC estimates that 1.8 million Americans died of opioid use in 2016, compared to the 1.5 million who died of heroin use in 2015.KARPSKI: We need to be mindful of how to address this issueKarpinsky also noted that more people are dying from drug overdose, but more importantly, they’re dying from a “mood disorder.”
“The opioid crisis is not a one-off event.
It is an epidemic,” KARPINKIS: The opioid epidemic has real world implicationsKARPSKI: We’re in the midst of a crisis, it’s just not being recognized at the national level.KARELL: We don’t know how many people are in pain or how they feel or what it’s doing to themKARPICKI: There is no easy solution to this issueThe CDC’s Karpinka said the U,S.
needs to take a look at how to curb the rise of the opioid crisis, and he called for the nation to take more aggressive steps to prevent the opioid overdose crisis.
Karski said the epidemic is going to get worse and that the U will need to address the problem, as well.
“I would say that the United Kingdom has a big problem with the opioid problem.
The Netherlands is a different story.
They have a problem,” he said.KARSKI: The U.K. is facing a crisis.
The U., you know, has a problem with it and they have a huge overdose problem.
There’s a lot of work to be done.KARR: But it’s a good example of what can be doneKARSKI, a professor at the U of T Scarborough School of Public Health, said it’s important to consider that the opiates are not a new or new-ish problem.
“They’ve been around for hundreds of years,” he explained.
“They’re not new to the human body, they have been around in the environment for thousands of years.”
There’s been a lot going on in human biology and how we use our body and how our brain function over the last few thousand years.
And it’s very, very well-documented,” he added.”
This is just one example of how we are evolving, in terms of what we do and what we’re becoming more and more dependent on.
It seems to be increasing more and increasing in severity and severity over time,” Karski concluded.
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