Notes

The article "Opioid Overdose Crisis" written by the National Institutes of Health argues that the main cause of opioid overdose is addiction and misuse, and that treatment and prevention will help stop this epidemic. The article was written on May 27, 2020. The article states that opioid overdose rates began increasing because in the late 1990s, pharmaceutical companies had told patients that they would not become addicted to the opioid pain relievers they were prescribed. As a result, healthcare providers began recommending and prescribing them more often, which led to people misusing these drugs. In an attempt to stop this crisis, the HSS (the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services) is working on improving access to treatment and recovery services for those in need, promoting the use of overdose-reversing drugs, and strengthening society's understanding of the epidemic (among other priorities that they listed in the article). I will probably use this article in my essay because it is straightforward and informative, uses logos by providing facts and statistics throughout the article, uses ethos by citing credible sources for data (such as the HHS), describes how the opioid overdose crisis began and lists potential solutions to stop this epidemic.


How to Help:
improving access to treatment and recovery services
promoting use of overdose-reversing drugs
strengthening our understanding of the epidemic through better public health surveillance
providing support for cutting-edge research on pain and addiction
advancing better practices for pain management


Reason:
"In the late 1990s, pharmaceutical companies reassured the medical community that patients would not become addicted to prescription opioid pain relievers, and healthcare providers began to prescribe them at greater rates. This subsequently led to widespread diversion and misuse of these medications before it became clear that these medications could indeed be highly addictive.3,4 Opioid overdose rates began to increase. "

Types of Opiods:
-prescription pain relievers
-heroin
-synthetic opioids such as fentanyl