Tag: prescription drug abuse
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U.S. attorney general hears from Central Ky. families of overdose victims, who offer suggestions on what needs to be done
U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch attended events in Lexington and Richmond this week as part of the first national Prescription Opioid and Heroin Epidemic Awareness Week, Bill Estep reports for...
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Heroin arrests and treatment are up in Appalachia, enlarging threat of HIV and hepatitis C outbreaks from unclean needles
Partly because it’s much cheaper than pain pills, heroin is “quickly making inroads in Southern and Eastern Kentucky,” the head of an anti-drug organization told Laura Ungar of The Courier-Journal....
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Study finds no link between tighter controls on prescription opioids and increased use of heroin; some researchers disagree
National overdose-death rates for heroin (red) and prescription opioids (blue) By Al Cross Kentucky Health News Soon after Kentucky cracked down on “pill mills” where prescription painkillers were easily available,...
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Senate passes addiction-treatment bill without extra funding Democrats wanted; Obama says he will sign it
Sen. Mitch McConnell and Speaker Paul Ryan, far right, spokeat an enrollment ceremony to send the bill to President Obama. The Senate passed and sent to President Obama on Wednesday...
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Dangers of HIV and hepatitis from intravenous drug use reach far beyond addicts and families, threatening a wide swath of Ky.
The growing use of heroin and the abuse of prescription painkillers in Kentucky also mean that the state “is being ravaged by the diseases that follow in their wake: hepatitis...
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Painkillers appear to increase risk of deaths other than overdoses, according to new study of Medicaid patients in Tennessee
“Accidental overdoses aren’t the only deadly risk from using powerful prescription painkillers,” The Associated Press reports. “The drugs may also contribute to heart-related deaths and other fatalities, new research suggests.”...
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Potent fentanyl, mixed with heroin, drives 14.7 percent increase in fatal drug overdoses in Kentucky from 2014 to 2015
The number of drug-overdose fatalities in Kentucky rose almost 15 percent in 2015, driven by a 247 percent jump in deaths involving fentanyl, a highly potent opioid that some traffickers...
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Doctors trying to reverse course on opioid prescriptions can find it difficult because of addiction, shortage of good alternatives
The epidemic of opioid overdoses, 60 percent of which are blamed on abuse or misuse, “is changing prescribing habits, but there’s still a lack of other pain medications, access to...
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Kentuckians agree regionally on tobacco controls; poll shows wide differences among regions in impact of drug abuse
By Al Cross Kentucky Health News In a state that once had more tobacco farms than any other, Kentuckians in all regions of the state support policies that discourage use...
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Kentucky is the only truly Appalachian state to have put a brake on fatal overdoses from narcotics
Kentucky is the only truly Appalachian state to have put a brake on fatal drug overdoses, report Rich Lord and Adam Smeltz of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette as part of a series...