Essential Health Benefits” Rule Covers Drug Addiction and Alcohol Abuse Treatment

By Join Together Staff | February 21, 2013 | Leave a comment | Filed in Alcohol, Drugs, Government, Healthcare, Insurance, Mental Health & Treatment

The federal government on Wednesday issued a final rule on “essential health benefits” that most health insurance plans must offer next year, including treatment of drug addiction and alcohol abuse.

The New York Times reports the Obama administration says 32 million people will gain access to coverage of mental health care as a result of the new benefits. An additional 30 million people who already have some mental health coverage will see an improvement in their benefits, Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius said. She noted the new ruling will make it easier for consumers to compare health plans.

In the past, nearly 20 percent of individuals purchasing insurance didn’t have access to mental health services, and nearly one-third had no coverage for substance use disorder services, according to a Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) news release. The new rule provides more Americans with access to quality health care that includes coverage for mental health and substance use disorder services, HHS states.

Each state will set its own benchmark insurance plan that reflects coverage typically offered by employers, the article notes. More than 30 states are using a plan offered by Blue Cross and Blue Shield as their benchmark.

Heroin Addiction on the Rise in New York State

By Join Together Staff | February 21, 2013 | Leave a comment | Filed in Community Related, Drugs & Prescription Drugs

A growing number of people are becoming addicted to heroin in New York state, according to drug treatment counselors and police. They say many people have switched to heroin from prescription painkillers, such as oxycodone and hydrocodone, the Associated Press reports.

Police report the people they arrest for heroin often started on painkillers prescribed by a doctor, then started purchasing them on the street. They turned to heroin because it is less expensive.

Many areas around the country are seeing a surge in heroin addiction that stems from prescription drug abuse. A study published in July 2012 in the New England Journal of Medicine found OxyContin abuse has decreased now that the painkiller has been reformulated to make it more difficult to misuse. Many people who abused the drug have switched to heroin.

The study included more than 2,500 people who were dependent on opioids, who were followed between July 2009 and March 2012. During that time, there was a 17 percent decrease in OxyContin abuse. In 2010, the company that makes OxyContin introduced a new version of the drug that is more difficult to inhale or inject. During the same period, heroin abuse doubled.

Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Drug-Sniffing Dog

By Join Together Staff | February 20, 2013 | 1 Comment | Filed in Drugs & Legal

The Supreme Court ruled police do not have to extensively document a drug-sniffing dog’s expertise to justify relying on the canine to search a vehicle, according to The Washington Post.

The unanimous ruling overturned a Florida Supreme Court decision involving Aldo, a German shepherd. After the dog detected drugs in a pickup truck, a police officer searched the truck and found 200 pseudoephedrine pills and 8,000 matches, which are used to make methamphetamine. The Florida Supreme Court ruled police must compile detailed evidence of the dog’s reliability before probable cause to search the vehicle is established.

In Tuesday’s ruling, Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan suggested proper training and certification of a dog, instead of how it performs in the field, could be enough. “The question — similar to every inquiry into probable cause — is whether all the facts surrounding a dog’s alert, viewed through the lens of common sense, would make a reasonably prudent person think that a search would reveal contraband or evidence of a crime,” she wrote. “A sniff is up to snuff when it meets that test. . . . Aldo’s did.”

The Supreme Court is scheduled to rule on a second dog-sniffing case, involving a chocolate Lab named Franky. Florida’s Supreme Court ruled the dog’s ability to detect marijuana growing inside a home in Miami by sniffing outside the house was unconstitutional. The state’s attorney general is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to reverse the ruling.

Franky, who recently retired after seven years with the Miami-Dade Police Department, is responsible for the seizure of more than 2.5 tons of marijuana and $4.9 million in drug-contaminated money.

Mapping Location of Alcohol Outlets, Drug Activity and Crime Could Aid Prevention

By Join Together Staff | February 20, 2013 | 1 Comment | Filed in Alcohol, Community Related, Drugs & Prevention

Mapping the location of alcohol outlets, drug activity and violent crimes could help police prevent violence, a new study suggests.

Researchers at the University of Michigan studied the relationship between violent crimes in Boston drug markets, and the types and densities of alcohol outlets in those areas, MedicalXpress reports. They analyzed data on homicides and aggravated assault incidents, drug arrests and 911 calls, along with 2009 alcohol outlet data from the Massachusetts Alcohol Beverage Control Commission. They also examined census data.

They found areas with the highest levels of violent crime were poorer and had greater numbers of alcohol outlets and higher drug arrest rates.

“Identification of such ‘hot spots’ may help in identifying micro-environments: blocks or intersections whose characteristics facilitate violent behavior. Our study helps identify such micro-environments, an emerging area of criminology research, in Boston,” the authors wrote in the American Journal of Public Health.

Number of Deadly Drug Overdoses Rises for 11th Year

By Join Together Staff | February 20, 2013 | 1 Comment | Filed in Prescription Drugs & Research

The number of deadly drug overdoses in the United States increased for the 11th consecutive year, according to new government data. More than 22,000 people died of overdoses involving prescription drugs in 2010, the Los Angeles Times reports.

In total, 38,329 people died of drug overdoses that year. Of the 57 percent whose deaths involved prescription drugs, three-quarters were due to painkillers such as OxyContin and Percocet, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. They reported their findings this week in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

More than 74 percent of deaths due to prescription drugs were accidental, while 17 percent were suicides, the article notes.

Opioids were found in 77 percent of overdoses involving benzodiazepines such as Valium, Xanax or Ativan. They were also involved in 65 percent of overdoses with antiepileptic or anti-Parkinsonian drugs, 47 percent of overdoses involving antidepressants, and 56 percent of overdoses with fever-reducing and anti-inflammatory medications.

Prevention Programs in Middle School May Reduce Later Prescription Drug Use

By Join Together Staff | February 19, 2013 | 1 Comment | Filed in Drugs, Prescription Drugs, Prevention & Youth

Substance abuse prevention programs that begin in middle school may help deter prescription drug abuse in later years, new research suggests.

Scientists analyzed findings from three studies of family- and school-based prevention programs designed for rural and small-town middle school students. They found students who went through substance abuse prevention programs were 20 percent to 65 percent less likely to abuse prescription drugs and opioids when they were between 17 and 25 years old, compared with students who did not participate in the programs.

The programs focused on general risk and protective factors of substance abuse. “Brief universal interventions have potential for public health impact by reducing prescription drug misuse among adolescents and young adults,” the researchers wrote in the American Journal of Public Health.

“The intervention effects were comparable or even stronger for participants who had started misusing substances prior to the middle school interventions, suggesting that these programs also can be successful in higher-risk groups,” lead author Richard Spoth, PhD, from the Partnerships in Prevention Science Institute at Iowa State University in Ames, said in a news release.

Nora Volkow, MD, Director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, noted that prescription medications can be helpful when they are prescribed to treat pain, anxiety, or attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. “However, their abuse can have serious consequences. We are especially concerned about prescription drug abuse among teens, who are developmentally at an increased risk for addiction,” she said.