Children whose parents or caregivers suffer from opioid use disorders are at risk for immediate trauma and negative health outcomes as well as lifelong consequences related to parental or personal opioid use. According to a 2019 report jointly produced by United Hospital Fund and the Boston Consulting Group, the rate of children affected by the opioid crisis in West Virginia was 5.4 percent in 2017— the highest rate in the country. Read the Full Story >>
opioid epidemic
Organizing Allies in WV
With the COVID-19 pandemic dominating the news, it’s easy for other public health issues to drop out of sight. Shepherdstown-based Community Education Group (CEG) is pointedly focused on West Virginia’s ongoing substance-use disorder epidemic. Read the Full Story >>
CEG Receives $500K Grant to Bolster HIV Fight in West Virginia
A new $500,000 grant will support CEG’s efforts to improve HIV prevention, testing, screening, and treatment in the state. Read the Full Story >>
Understanding the Connection Between Loneliness and Addiction
I couldn’t move. I had reached the point where I could no longer continue living a life marred in addiction. It wasn’t simply a matter of being sick and tired of being sick and tired—I was, in a tangible way, killing myself. I laid on the floor of my wretched trailer apartment under a blanket, Read the Full Story >>
From the Dark Web to the Streets
Fentanyl, Inc. opens with the story of eighteen-year-olds Bailey Henke and Kain Schwandt as they go on a road trip across the snowed plains of North Dakota. Henke and Schwain plan on visiting family, but they have an ulterior motive: they hope their time on the road will help them kick their addiction to fentanyl, a drug they once discovered by buying medical patches on the black market. Read the Full Story >>
Observer Contributor Co-Develops Memorial Site for Opioid Victims
If you or someone you love has lost someone to the opioid crisis, then it’s worth your while to check out "All Our Hearts"—an online memorial project developed in part by Observer contributor and Jefferson County native Lena Camilletti. Read the Full Story >>
Substance-Use Disorder & Person-First Language: Why It Matters
How we perceive and treat people with substance-use disorder has a direct impact on access to treatment and long-term recovery for this community. The language we use to identify this disease is crucial in addressing solutions for people experiencing it. Read the Full Story >>
The Distance Between, by Timothy J. Hillegonds
As I read Timothy J. Hillegonds’ harrowing memoir of addiction and youthful rage, The Distance Between (University of Nebraska Press, 2019), I was reminded of a sentence written by one of my favorite fiction authors, Richard Lange: “We can only, all of us, run so far before what we really are and what is meant to be catch up to us.” Read the Full Story >>
A Deep-Dive Into Anger, Abuse, and Resurrection with Debut Author Timothy J. Hillegonds
A Chicago native, author Timothy J. Hillegonds stepped foot in Shepherdstown for the first time in 2012, and found himself smitten from the start. Seven years later, he readily calls Shepherdstown his second home, and by getting to know West Virginia’s oldest town as intimately as he has, he’s also become familiar with the Mountain State’s unfortunate connection to the nationwide opioid epidemic. Read the Full Story >>
American Overdose
The opioid epidemic has been described as “one of the greatest mistakes of modern medicine.” But calling it a mistake is a generous rewriting of the history of greed, corruption, and indifference that pushed the U.S. into consuming more than 80 percent of the world’s opioid painkillers. Read the Full Story >>
Finally: A Comprehensive Program for Substance Abuse in the Panhandle
Mountaineer Recovery Center, targeted to open in September 2019, will be the first in the state of West Virginia to provide this level of treatment, according to someone’s needs all in one place. Read the Full Story >>
WV Air National Guard Expands Student-Mentor Relationships in the Panhandle
Students in the Eastern Panhandle have recently gained exposure to uniformed soldiers in the hallways of their schools. The men and women of the West Virginia Air National Guard (WVANG) 167th Airlift Wing, the 130th Airlift Wing, and the Army National Guard have been diligently working to help combat the state’s opioid addiction crisis by offering various mentoring opportunities to elementary and middle school students. Read the Full Story >>
Addiction Community Embraces Yet Another Advocate
Hundreds of voluntary recovery coaches throughout the state of West Virginia are helping those in need of services that are often nonexistent or hard to access. Greater Recovery and Community Empowerment (GRaCE), founded by president Rev. John Unger, taps into the "foundational aspect of instilling hope.” Read the Full Story >>
America’s Opioid Killing Fields
Award-winning journalist Beth Macy’s Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company that Addicted America comes as a timely, in-depth look at America’s opioid crisis that tells the stories of its victims and traces the social and economic roots of the epidemic. Read the Full Story >>
Panhandle’s Newest Addiction Endeavor Secures Local Coordinator
Addiction does not discriminate. Bridging the divides in our polarized country is an essential way for people to work together to fight the opioid epidemic, which is what One America West Virginia is trying to do. Read the Full Story >>