���ϳԹ���

While the face of the opioid crisis has predominantly been considered white and rural, overdose deaths among Latinos have skyrocketed in recent years, with experts attributing the growing numbers to the rise of fentanyl, especially mixed with other drugs. Overdose deaths among Latinos have nearly tripled since 2011, according to a report published this month in the American Journal of Epidemiology. (Jiménez J. and Telemundo, 3/23)

More on the drug crisis —

State officials recently flagged the presence of an anti-seizure medication in some opioid deaths in 2022, a year when a record-breaking 237 Vermonters died from accidental opioid overdoses. Thirty-one of the fatalities, or 13% of the total, had taken gabapentin, a prescription drug used to control convulsions and relieve nerve pain, according to a Vermont Department of Health report issued Monday. (Tan, 3/23)

As illegal opioid use rises among young people, several bills filed by state lawmakers would require Texas teachers to be trained and equipped to treat fentanyl overdoses, both on campus and at school-related events. Several bills call for educators and school staff at public, charter and private schools, as well as those at colleges and universities, to know how to reverse deadly opioid overdoses with Narcan and other overdose medications known as “opioid antagonists.” (Simpson, 3/23)

Deshawn Hendricks, 26, wants to check his drugs for the powerful opioid fentanyl when he can, because as a crack user, he worries it could cause a life-threatening overdose. Matthew Todd, 32, tests for another reason: As an opioid user, he has come to depend on the quick and intense high fentanyl provides, and wants to make sure what he purchased is “real.” On a sloping sidewalk that runs under the Grand Concourse in the Bronx, both men accepted fentanyl test strips from outreach workers on a recent Thursday, along with sandwiches, water and Narcan, a drug that reverses overdoses. Around them, a few people openly injected dope, as an occasional pedestrian threaded past. (Otterman, 3/24)

Matthew Salzman, assistant professor at Cooper University Hospital, said that nothing compares to the damage that xylazine does to the human skin. In his 20 years as an emergency medicine physician, he said, “The wounds are worse than I’ve ever seen.” “Historically, infections from injection-drug use are not uncommon,” said Salzman. “We see patients with abscesses, skin infections and HIV, hepatitis-C. But these soft-tissue wounds with xylazine are different from anything prior to just a year or two ago.” A number of his patients, Salzman adds, “are terribly malnourished,” which makes their wounds harder to heal — as do the behaviors of opioid-use disorder itself. (Biddle, 3/24)

Kentucky’s governor took emergency action Thursday to halt the sale of a drug commonly known as “gas station heroin” that he warned poses a threat in a state battling addiction and overdose problems. Gov. Andy Beshear said the emergency regulation he signed applies to products containing tianeptine, an unregulated drug that he said produces opioid-like effects. (Schreiner, 3/23)

In other news about addiction —

The states that have legalized sports betting are reporting record levels of wagering and revenues, but with that growth comes questions about gambling addiction and whether regulators and sportsbooks are doing enough to fight it. (Elliott, 3/22)