drug abuse

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Mom Who Found Daughter Dead Writes Devastatingly Honest Obituary

Kelsey Endicott, 23, died of accidental overdose

(Newser) - Kathleen Errico is the latest devastated family member to take part in a heartbreaking trend: being brutally honest about a person's untimely death. Errico found her 23-year-old daughter dead in her bed, TV still on, at 3:45am on April 2. Kelsey Endicott, who leaves behind a 2-year-old son,...

Airmen at Nuclear Base Investigated for Drug Use

It's the latest Air Force embarrassment

(Newser) - The Air Force is investigating about a dozen airmen at a nuclear missile base for alleged use of illegal drugs, in some cases possibly including cocaine, anonymous defense officials tell the AP . The drug investigation at FE Warren Air Force Base, home of the 90th Missile Wing, was to be...

CDC to Doctors: Cool It With the Painkiller Prescriptions

New recommendations aim to curb opioid abuse

(Newser) - Prescription painkillers should not be a first-choice for treating common ailments like back pain and arthritis, according to new federal guidelines designed to reshape how doctors prescribe drugs like OxyContin and Vicodin. Amid an epidemic of addiction and abuse tied to these powerful opioids drugs, the Centers for Disease Control...

Addicts Find Ways Around &#39;Abuse-Deterrent&#39; OxyContin
Addicts Find Ways Around 'Abuse-Deterrent' OxyContin
STUDY SAYS
Mar 12, 2015 12:32 PM CDT

Addicts Find Ways Around 'Abuse-Deterrent' OxyContin

People find new ways to dissolve the pills—or turn to heroin, study says

(Newser) - When an "abuse-deterrent" version of OxyContin was introduced in 2010, the intent was clear: "to make OxyContin more difficult to solubilize or crush, thus discouraging abuse through injection and inhalation," the New England Journal of Medicine noted in 2012. Made with special binders, the revamped pills would...

Robin Thicke Confesses to Rampant Drug Abuse: Deposition

Pharrell also put on the spot in lawsuit with Marvin Gaye's family

(Newser) - The past year or so could've been better for Robin Thicke: The family of legend Marvin Gaye sued Thicke for ripping off Gaye in creating his hit song "Blurred Lines" (Thicke has a countersuit against them); Thicke's wife, Paula Patton, dumped him ; and he made his situation...

Combo Painkiller Designed to Be Tougher to Abuse

FDA approves opioid that won't cause euphoria when crushed

(Newser) - The FDA has approved a new form of OxyContin that unites two unlikely bedfellows in an attempt to curb abuse, reports AP . The drug from Purdue Pharma is called Targiniq ER, and it combines oxycodone—the main painkilling ingredient in OxyContin, one that causes feelings of euphoria—with naloxene, which...

Only 1 State Rejects Prescription Drug Database

'Welcome to Missouri—America's drugstore'

(Newser) - With prescription painkiller abuse, addiction, and overdoses a massive problem across the country, some 49 states have brought in databases to track excess prescriptions—and then there is Missouri. The state is the only holdout that has refused to create a monitoring program, even though law enforcement officials say the...

Tennessee Makes It Illegal to Get High While Pregnant
Tennessee Makes It Illegal
to Get High While Pregnant
in case you missed it
May 3, 2014 12:00 PM CDT

Tennessee Makes It Illegal to Get High While Pregnant

Doing so could land you in jail, starting in July

(Newser) - Starting July 1, if you're pregnant and use drugs while living in Tennessee, you can be charged with a crime for causing harm to your unborn baby. Gov. Bill Haslam signed the controversial law yesterday, the Tennessean reports. Civil and reproductive rights groups had opposed it, saying it would...

Most Pill Poppers Turn to Doctors for Their Fix

Friends, family to blame among occasional users: study

(Newser) - When it comes to prescription painkiller abuse, officials have generally considered users' friends and family to be the main source of the drugs. But a new CDC study says it's doctors themselves who are most to blame for supplying the substances to chronic users, the LA Times reports. The...

How to Save Heroin Addicts
 How to Save Heroin Addicts 
OPINION
Feb 4, 2014 12:59 PM CST

How to Save Heroin Addicts

Experts weigh in on changes that should be made to treatment

(Newser) - Could Philip Seymour Hoffman have been saved? That's what two columns are arguing today:
  • On CNN , drug experts Ethan Nadelmann and Tony Newman outline a 7-step plan to stop overdoses—105 people in the US die each day from heroin or pharmaceutical opioid ODs. The first step: Make treatment
...

Jersey Shore's New Problem: Heroin Overdoses

Fatal overdoses more than doubled last year in Ocean County, NJ

(Newser) - It's been a rough week for New Jersey , and an NBC News investigation only adds to the state's woes: It found that fatal heroin and prescription drug overdoses at the Jersey Shore more than doubled last year, with 112 deaths in Ocean County compared to 2012's 53...

Rob Ford Drove Drunk Through School Zones, Partied With Hookers

One begins to wonder how he had time to govern

(Newser) - For your average big city mayor, admitting that you bought illegal drugs while in office would be the most damaging thing to happen in a day—but Rob Ford 's not your average mayor . Soon after a press conference in which the crack-smoking, binge-drinking Toronto mayor claimed his closet...

Billie Joe Armstrong: Meltdown Was Turning Point

That's when he knew he had to get help, he tells 'Rolling Stone'

(Newser) - For the first time, Green Day frontman Billie Joe Armstrong is talking about rehab and substance abuse in the wake of his onstage meltdown last year . He'd struggled with alcohol and prescription drugs for years—"I couldn't predict where I was going to end up at the...

Sao Paulo to Forcibly Commit Crack Addicts

Brazilian state adopts new strategy amid soaring demand

(Newser) - Officials in Brazil's most populous state say they will start forcing adult crack addicts to go to rehabilitation centers in an effort to curb growing use of the drug. The Sao Paulo state plan was announced yesterday and is scheduled to begin in 10 days. Addicts who refuse treatment...

Military Drinking a &#39;Public Health Crisis&#39;
 Military Drinking a 
 'Public Health Crisis' 
study says
Sep 18, 2012 6:56 AM CDT

Military Drinking a 'Public Health Crisis'

New study finds 20% of troops drank heavily in 2008

(Newser) - Substance abuse in the US military has escalated to the point that it is now a "public health crisis," according to a new report. The Defense Department requested the analysis by the Institute of Medicine, which found that:
  • Around 20% of active-duty troops said they drank heavily in
...

City With Biggest Heroin Problem: Chicago

It has nearly twice the ER visits as New York City

(Newser) - Chicago has earned the unwanted distinction of having the nation's worst heroin problem. And by at least one measure, no other city is close. The Chicago area registered about 24,000 ER visits related to heroin between 2008 and 2010, says a new report by the Illinois Consortium on...

Forget OxyContin: Opana Now Most-Abused Painkiller

But new formula will cause addicts to seek another drug

(Newser) - The powerful painkiller Opana has replaced OxyContin as the drug of choice for addicts and pharmacy robbers. Users switched to Opana—the trade name for oxymorphone—after OxyContin's maker reformulated its pills to make them harder to snort, chew, or inject for a quick high. But Opana's makers...

Russia's Top Narc Blames Beatles for Drugs

Their 'mind-expanding' jaunts expanded problem: Yevgeny Bryun

(Newser) - All you need is drugs, drugs, drugs. That seems to be the message the Beatles communicated to Russia's top narcotics-fighting official, who believes the Fab Four were largely responsible for kicking off the global drug problem. "After the Beatles went to expand their consciousness in India ashrams, they...

Teen Mom Star Ordered to Prison
 Teen Mom Ordered to Prison 
Jun 6, 2012 12:01 AM CDT

Teen Mom Ordered to Prison

Judge reinstates Amber Portwood's 5-year term in stir

(Newser) - A violent, drug-abusive star of MTV's Teen Mom reality program is about to be sent away to prison for at least two years. Amber Portwood, now 22, dropped out of a drug rehab program last month, and an Indiana judge yesterday reinstated a five-year sentence he imposed after she...

Behind Derek Boogaard's Downfall, Tons of Pills

Team doctors prescribed him huge amount of hydrocodone, oxycodone

(Newser) - As if Derek Boogaard's death at 28 last year wasn't tragic enough, the New York Times today delves into the reality that preceded the NHL enforcer's accidental overdose—and it's a mind-bogglingly pill-filled one. Boogaard's father, a member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, gave...

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