Answer Addiction

Author: The Fix

  • Judge: Insurer Discriminated Against People With Mental Illness, Addiction

    Judge: Insurer Discriminated Against People With Mental Illness, Addiction

    People attempting to access mental health treatment are still being denied coverage at twice the rate of those seeking physical healthcare.

    A federal court has ruled that one of the largest health insurance companies in the U.S. has been discriminating against people with mental illness and addiction disorders by failing to apply coverage standards equally across physical and mental ailments. U.S. Chief Magistrate Judge Joseph C. Spero issued a “blistering” 106-page ruling stating that United Behavioral Health, a subsidiary of UnitedHealth Group, effectively discriminated against thousands of people seeking treatment for these issues from 2011 to 2017, according to The Los Angeles Times.

    The Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act in 2008 made it illegal for insurers to apply different criteria to patients experiencing mental health issues than those experiencing physical health issues when determining what to cover. Unfortunately, people attempting to access mental health treatment are still being denied coverage at twice the rate of those seeking physical healthcare.

    According to the report by Anita Raghavan, the blame for this rests on a lack of enforcement of the 2008 law by the overstretched Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA).

    Labor Secretary R. Alexander Acosta wrote in a 2018 report that this small division of the Department of Labor has only 400 investigators and 100 benefit advisors working to keep track of about 5 million health benefit plans across the country.

    In the space of two years, the EBSA was only able to issue 136 citations to health insurance companies for violating the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act. To make matters worse, the agency can’t assess civil monetary penalties to deter future violators.

    The inability to get coverage for mental health issues have left many without desperately needed treatment. This is such a common problem that the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) has a guide for what individuals can do if they’ve been denied such coverage.

    This includes a list of “commonly denied types of care,” which appears to include all levels of care from diagnosis and common psychotherapy, “intermediate” care like outpatient or partial inpatient treatment, and full residential hospitalization.

    Source: Statista/National Survey on Drug Use and Health

    Meanwhile, reports of families struggling to get the appropriate care for mentally ill family members proliferate. In September 2018, WFYI did a story on Matthew Timion and his fight to get coverage for treatment that his adopted son desperately needed.

    “He was cutting himself and he’s hearing voices and he is threatening to run away and kill me,” Timion said. “The insurance company says, ‘Well, he hasn’t done that in three or four days now, he’s good to go home.’ And the hospital said, ‘No, he has to stay.’”

    The problem has become so severe that parents are increasingly resorting to giving up custody of their children because once they do, the state will be forced to pay for the necessary mental health treatment. Adoptive parents call this decision “gut-wrenching,” but without health insurance coverage for expensive treatment plans, they often have little choice.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Black Lawmakers Push Back On Legalization In New York

    Black Lawmakers Push Back On Legalization In New York

    Lawmakers want to ensure that Black Americans will benefit from legalization after years of being disproportionately affected by marijuana legislation.

    In New York, efforts to legalize recreational marijuana are facing an unexpected hurdle, as black lawmakers vow to withhold support if the legislation does not do enough to ensure that minorities will benefit from the legal cannabis industry. 

    Assembly majority leader, Crystal Peoples-Stokes, the first black woman to serve in that role, told The New York Times that none of the 10 states that have legalized cannabis have done enough to make up for decades of marijuana arrests and incarceration that have disproportionately affected African Americans. 

    “I haven’t seen anyone do it correctly,” she said.

    Although Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s proposal has promised a “social and economic equity plan,” Peoples-Stokes said it is lacking in specifics. 

    “They thought we were going to trust that at the end of the day, these communities would be invested in. But that’s not something I want to trust,” she said. “If it’s not required in the statute, then it won’t happen.”

    The governor’s counsel, Alphonso David, noted that including too much detail in the legislation may not stand the test of time. 

    “Some people are looking for a level of detail that may not be appropriate for legislation, and we have to be careful how we implement the legislation so we don’t have to change it every few years,” said David.

    Gov. Cuomo wanted marijuana legalization to happen quickly enough to be included in the state’s budget, which will be passed in April. Initially, this seemed likely, but given the opposition, Cuomo said he is “no longer confident” about meeting that deadline. 

    Peoples-Stokes agreed. “It’s not going to go the way it looks now,” she said. 

    The assemblywoman has introduced an alternative to Cuomo’s legalization bill. Peoples-Stokes’ plan would prioritize licenses for marijuana businesses in communities that have been disproportionately affected by marijuana prohibition, including communities of color.

    In addition, her bill calls for half of marijuana revenue to be directed toward community supports, including job training. 

    Although no state has written social justice plans into marijuana legalization, efforts to prioritize minority business owners are springing up around the country. 

    “We actually do have to overcorrect. People from our communities, black and brown communities, were the one first ones to be criminalized. Why shouldn’t we be the first ones to benefit?” Kassandra Frederique, the New York state director of the Drug Policy Alliance, told USA Today.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Students "Take Back" Billboards To Reduce Alcohol Advertising

    Students "Take Back" Billboards To Reduce Alcohol Advertising

    Students at the school said that alcohol use among teens is universally accepted so their anti-drinking campaign is necessary. 

    A school in California is trying to reduce the number of alcohol advertisements that its students see by purchasing billboard ad space and replacing alcohol ads with messages that encourage kids to avoid drinking. 

    A nonprofit associated with Roosevelt High in Fresno purchased the ad space and replaced it with an ad showing teens who chose education over alcohol. There are plans for at least one more billboard in Fresno. 

    Fresno Unified Superintendent Bob Nelson told ABC30, “For folks that are making good choices and prioritizing education over drugs and alcohol that you have some like-minded colleagues. So kids finding each other and willing to say hey I’m not willing to let anything get in my way of college is a really strong message.”

    The billboard that is up now shows eight students from Roosevelt High with the caption “I choose my education over alcohol.” 

    Students at the school said that alcohol use among teens is universally accepted, so taking a dramatic stance with something as visible as billboard is important. 

    Sophomore Nicole Lee said, “When we go to parties, my uncles would give my cousins drinks when they’re 18, so you’re basically breaking the law. I came to a point where I’m taking a stand so I’m going to do something to change that.” 

    Christina Garcia, another sophomore, agreed that talking about the dangers of alcohol for teens is important. 

    “Coming from me as a youth I have friends that say drinking is this and drinking is my life and OK it’s your life but what about your life. You’re just going to throw away your life for alcohol,” she said.

    Despite the experiences of teens at Roosevelt High, researchers have found that teen drinking rates are actually decreasing. According to researchers who conducted the Monitoring The Future survey, which looks at substance use among middle and high school students, teen drinking peaked in 1997 and has decreased 60% since then. 

    Last year, binge drinking among seniors in high school decreased by 2.8%. Fourteen percent of high school seniors reported that they had engaged in binge drinking in the prior two weeks. 

    At the same time, vaping of nicotine and marijuana has increased dramatically among teens, worrying health providers. More than 7% of teens reported that they had vaped marijuana in the past 30 days, while the percent of teens who had vaped nicotine doubled to 21%.  

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Whole Foods CEO Would Like to See Marijuana Sold in Supermarkets

    Whole Foods CEO Would Like to See Marijuana Sold in Supermarkets

    Whole Foods already sells some cannabis-based products like organic hemp seeds and cannabinoid supplements.

    John Mackey, the co-founder and current CEO of Whole Foods Market, told an audience in Texas that if the state legalized cannabis, he would support efforts to sell it in supermarkets.

    Mackey, who was speaking at a staged conversation with the Texas Tribune, said that “chances are good” for cannabis sales in grocery stores like his natural and organic food chain, which has more than 450 locations in North America and the United Kingdom.

    When asked for an estimated time frame on when cannabis might be available on his shelves, Mackey noted that the decision lay with “the market and the government regulations.”

    As High Times noted, Mackey’s comments about cannabis in grocery stores were actually prompted by a question from an audience member about whether insects would ever be offered as an alternative protein source at Whole Foods. Mackey said that his stores would consider that option before adding his comments about legalization efforts in the Lone Star State.

    “If cannabis is ever passed in Texas, chances are good that grocery stores will be selling that, too,” he said. “You just never know what happens over time with markets. They change and evolve.”

    Mackey did not voice an opinion as to what cannabis-related products would be sold at his stores – Whole Foods already sells some cannabis-based products like organic hemp seeds and cannabinoid supplements – and concluded his thoughts on the possibility by stating, “Let’s see what happens with the market and government regulations over time.”

    Legal sale of marijuana is currently restricted in Texas, though low-THC cannabis is available to patients who have been diagnosed with “intractable” epilepsy as part of the Texas Compassionate Use Act of 2015. Three organizations were licensed to dispense cannabis in 2017, per the act’s requirements.

    House Bill 1365, which was introduced by Texas state representative Eddie Lucio III (D-Brownsville) in February 2019, would expand the Compassionate Use Act to allow treatment for cancer, autism, PTSD and other forms of epilepsy, and would expand the kinds of cannabis available to patients to include vaporizations, tinctures and lotions, but not smokeable cannabis.

    High Times also noted that Whole Foods is not the only food retailer to consider stocking cannabis. The United Bodegas of America has expressed its desire for New York Governor Andrew Cuomo to allow bodegas – the small, independent grocery/convenience and wine stores that are located throughout New York City and other major metropolises – to sell cannabis. 

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • The Ugly Side of Dating in 12-Step Programs

    The Ugly Side of Dating in 12-Step Programs

    When someone acts perfectly, their best selves, when that’s what they present to us, we often fall for it. I wasn’t special or not special. I was typical.

    Recently I was in a relationship with a guy I met in the program. We’d been together about four months, on again-off again. Really twice on, twice off.

    The first breakup wasn’t pretty — we’d had an argument one evening and when we parted he wasn’t happy. I’d say he was disappointed, but it was more than that. But after years of working my AA program, my “people pleaser” was quick to reassure him we were “good.” In fact, while the argument wasn’t really that bad and could have even been food for growth, his anger had frightened me. I’m eleven years sober, he had four years. I thought the recipe was for love, not disaster.

    The truth is: I’d been on the fence about him since we met.

    On our first date, he told me that he’d threatened to kill someone during a relapse. This left me feeling unsettled, but when I told my friends and therapist, I learned it was apparently really, really bad. I thought well, it was a relapse, not the type of thing he would do sober. I remembered him also telling me of a breakup that had happened when he was still using. Maybe all of his negative behavior was when he was using. I’d been through this before with sober men, and it was altogether confusing. An ex had gotten physical with a few women before I knew him, and I assumed it was while he was drinking. I learned at the end of our relationship that it was actually during a dry period. 

    I sound so judgmental. I guess we all have to be, to some extent, while we’re choosing who and who not to date. But apparently I’m not judgmental enough. I ended up dating the man who’d threatened someone’s life, and now here we were, post-fight, all my protective feelings swirling around inside me. I hate it when people say they were a hot mess, because it implies that they are or were hot, which is a little too narcissistic for my taste, so let’s just say I was a mess. (Not that I’m completely free of narcissism, but I choose to believe in the good in myself and focus on my character defects one at a time, rather than bundling them together.) 

    I’d like to say I was fine, but really I wasn’t fine. I was going to act like I was, though, to maintain the status quo. In other words, I’d said everything was okay, so I’d act like it was. Acting as if is a skill I learned fairly early in sobriety, and it had served me well.

    The morning after the fight I awoke to a long Facebook messenger message, really a few long messages from him, clustered together. This was the guy I was dating exclusively, and sleeping with, and basically in a “sober” relationship with. His messages were angry and spiteful. I’d thought all was okay enough to at least be civil to one another, but no such luck. And I felt sick about it. 

    I can’t remember if we spoke after the messages, but I don’t think we did. I was livid and hurt, an ugly combination of emotions. I broke up with him. Over messenger. The way we loved, we died.

    The Resurrection

    Until he started love-bombing me. I call it “The Resurrection.” It started with things he was going to give me, restaurants he wanted to take me to. He gifted me with a very personal family heirloom… and on and on. After about a month, I caved. Our second-round first date was at a park near my home. When this guy was on, he was on. We ended up kissing at my place, just kissing, and I was falling in love like I never had with him before. When someone acts perfectly, their best selves, when that’s what they present to us, we often fall for it. I wasn’t special or not special. I was typical. 

    The love affair lasted about two days, and then the old him reappeared: not listening well, an underlying frustration, a continuation of great and comforting sex (that’s where the connection stemmed from). All in all, except for the sex, nothing very exciting. Except I’m leaving out my behavior in the whole episode. Knowing I didn’t feel as strongly about him as he did about me, I should have ended it the first time around.

    Then the second time, about a month in, we went to a couple of galleries and walked around on a Friday night when everyone in New York City, like us, was mulling around for free. I wasn’t in a very good mood; my insecurity and self-hatred were getting the best of me. We had an argument — again, not so bad — but he got too angry for the situation.

    I woke up the next morning, upset and out of sorts, and called my sponsor, as I had a few times during our courtship. I asked her if I should keep my date with him that night. For the third time, she suggested I take a break from seeing him, but I didn’t listen. Suggestions are just that, I told myself, and at 11 years sober, who was I to have to listen to my sponsor.

    I went over to his place around six that evening. We took a taxi to a restaurant we liked, and the whole ride there was awkward, with short bursts of forced conversation. It got worse at the restaurant and culminated in me telling him I didn’t have the same feelings for him that he had for me. Read: My Part. I shouldn’t have gone in the first place, should have broken up with him the night before (as I didn’t hesitate to mention during what I now realize was a fight from the minute I set foot in his apartment).

    But then his anger moved in, like a dark cloud.

    “I’m breaking up with you, bitch,” he said and slammed his hand on the table. He started to walk out, which I feared would leave me stranded, far from home, with no means of getting back to my warm apartment and my sweet cat. At times of high stress, I, like so many others, go to the worst place, a place of abandonment and rejection. And as much as he really might have been rejecting me, I knew in my heart I had left the relationship months ago.

    I ended up begging him to let me ride home with him — that feeling of being stranded, scared, and alone that reminds me of all the reasons I drank and drugged — and we ended up sharing a taxi back to his apartment so I could take the subway the rest of the way home. During the 45-minute ride he alternated between yelling at me and saying he wasn’t going to be mean to me any longer, an agreement he broke countless times during the drive. He spewed hate at me while I mainly stayed silent and looked out the window. And then he said the most danger-filled and threatening thing anyone’s ever said to me: “if you think this is bad, try pouring alcohol and coke on it.”

    The moral? I should have left sort-of-well-enough-alone. After I knew who he was, I never should have gone back and dated him the second time. Or, if I am honest with myself, the first. I’m glad I got out before something really awful happened, though I remain worried that he might stalk me. I don’t know if that’s his style, but he did tell me that I had reason to be terrified of him. He said there are only a few people in the city who he hates, and they are scared of him.

    I’m dating again and it’s hard. I’ve had difficult breakups, in and out of sobriety, but this has to be the worst. It’s an all-time low; the one that leaves you with the most vile taste in your mouth. I don’t even know if I want to publish this, for fear he might read it, for fear you might. I’m going to go with HP on this one — pray like there’s no tomorrow, pray to be of service, to learn what HP has brought me in offering me this experience which I have embraced and then, finally, un-embraced, and to affirm that whatever happens, I’ll be taken care of.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Why Do Schools Have More Police On Campus Than Mental Health Staff?

    Why Do Schools Have More Police On Campus Than Mental Health Staff?

    On average, schools had just 1 counselor per 444 students, according to a report from the ACLU.

    In schools across the nation, students are more likely to see police officers than nurses or counselors, according to a new report.

    In fact, a third of public school students are enrolled in schools with a police officer but without a counselor, nurse, psychologist or social worker. 

    Using data form the U.S. Department of Education, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) compiled a report, “Cops and No Counselors: How the Lack of School Mental Health Staff is Harming Students.”

    The ACLU found that mental health access is sparse in schools, as more funding is directed toward police and other security. 

    The report points out that the suicide rate among teens increased 70% between 2006 and 2016, and school is often the first and more accessible option for teens who need help. 

    “Today’s school children are experiencing record levels of depression and anxiety, alongside multiple forms of trauma,” the report reads. “School counselors, nurses, social workers, and psychologists are frequently the first to see children who are sick, stressed, traumatized, may act out, or may hurt themselves or others. This is especially true in low-income districts where other resources are scarce. Students are 21 times more likely to visit school-based health centers for treatment than anywhere else.”

    Schools with adequate mental health care see improved attendance, better graduation rates and fewer disciplinary problems, the reported noted.

    Yet, on average, schools had just 1 counselor per 444 students—something Eric Sparks, assistant director of the American School Counselor Association, says is absurd. 

    “It’s physically impossible for them to have an impact on students with developmental needs,” he said. “We have many schools where students don’t have access to a school counselor and some schools don’t have a school counselor.”

    On the other hand, the presence of police can contribute to the school-to-prison pipeline, the report authors argue. 

    “Schools are under-resourced and students are overcriminalized,” report authors wrote. 

    However, executive director of the National Association of School Resource Officers, Mo Canady, told CNN that tying the issue of police presence and lack of counselors together is a false comparison. 

    ”It doesn’t need to be one or the other, we need counselors and mental health specialists,” said Canady.

    “We definitely need specifically trained [school resource officers] to stand shoulder-to shoulder with mental health specialists. We need folks in there who are not afraid to be vulnerable and engage with students, listen to their concerns and just be real with them.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Deregulating Buprenorphine Could Save Thousands Of Lives, Physicians Say

    Deregulating Buprenorphine Could Save Thousands Of Lives, Physicians Say

    Fewer than 7% of US physicians currently have the DEA waivers necessary to prescribe buprenorphine.

    An opinion piece by two physicians published in STAT Tuesday argues that deregulation of the opioid addiction treatment drug, buprenorphine, could save tens of thousands of lives every year.

    The authors, University of Rochester Professor Kevin Fiscella and Sarah E. Wakeman, director of the Massachusetts General Hospital Substance Use Disorders Initiative, strongly believe that making it as easy to prescribe buprenorphine as OxyContin or fentanyl is essential to the fight to end the opioid epidemic in the U.S.

    According to Fiscella and Wakeman, less than 7% of physicians in the country currently have the DEA waivers necessary to prescribe buprenorphine.

    Buprenorphine and methadone are currently the only approved drug therapies for opioid addiction disorders and is considered much safer than prescription opioids used to treat pain.

    However, doctors and nurse practitioners must jump through extra hoops in order to obtain permission to prescribe buprenorphine, while all DEA-licensed physicians are allowed to prescribe OxyContin and fentanyl.

    According to the Florida Academy of Physician Assistants (FAPA), all physician assistants need only to take a three-hour course in order to obtain a DEA license allowing them to prescribe controlled substances, including opioids. In contrast, physician assistants must go through 24 hours of training in order to prescribe buprenorphine on top of the training for the standard DEA license.

    An increasing number of studies have found that the over-prescription of OxyContin and, more recently, the misuse of the incredibly potent opioid fentanyl together have fueled an epidemic that killed close to 50,000 people in 2017 and likely more in 2018. So why, Fiscella and Wakeman ask, is a safer opioid that is approved to treat opioid addiction more difficult to prescribe?

    In order to prescribe buprenorphine, medical professionals must complete extra training, apply for a specially marked license, and agree to allow the DEA to inspect their patient records. All of these extra steps both increase stigma against addiction disorders and place unnecessary barriers in front of what is widely considered to be effective treatment for this massive problem.

    “Patients often experience barriers trying to fill prescriptions for buprenorphine—told they cannot fill it if the “X” is missing from the prescriber’s license number—or feel shamed when filling buprenorphine prescriptions,” the authors wrote. “Some feel embarrassed telling other doctors they are taking buprenorphine.”

    Fiscella and Wakeman conclude that deregulating buprenorphine—essentially making it as easy to prescribe as OxyContin and fentanyl—would increase treatment rates for opioid addiction and cause deaths from overdose to plummet. They cite policy in France which implemented this kind of deregulation in 1995 and resulted in a whopping 80% decrease in opioid overdoses.

    “[E]ven if deregulation of buprenorphine prescribing led to ‘just’ a 50% decrease, that would mean 20,000 fewer deaths.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Can Having One Drink A Day Affect Your Health?

    Can Having One Drink A Day Affect Your Health?

    A new study investigated the connection between moderate drinking and hypertension.

    It’s long been suggested by studies that moderate alcohol consumption can be good for the heart—but a new study finds otherwise.

    Dr. Amer Aladin, a cardiovascular medicine fellow at Wake Forest Baptist Health, led the study which looked at over 17,000 American adult’s medical records. They found a correlation between as little as one drink a day and increased risk for hypertension, or high blood pressure–a know risk factor for heart attack.

    The increased risk for hypertension was two-fold for moderate drinkers, the research showed. The study defined Stage 1 hypertension as a systolic top blood pressure reading of 130 to 139 mmHg and a diastolic bottom reading of 80 to 90 mmHg. Stage 2 hypertension was defined as a systolic blood pressure of 140 mmHg or higher and a diastolic reading of 90 mmHg or more.

    “I think this will be a turning point for clinical practice, as well as for future research, education and public health policy regarding alcohol consumption,” lead author Dr. Aladin told NBC News. “[This is] the first study showing that both heavy and moderate alcohol consumption can increase hypertension,” he said.

    It is important to note that because the study was observational, it can only show a correlation between drinking and hypertension—it does not prove cause and effect. 

    The Wake Forest researchers, led by Dr. Aladin, looked at the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES III), a large decades long study led by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This data included 17,059 U.S. adults who signed on to NHANES between 1988 and 1994.

    The five groups included abstainers; former drinkers; those who consumed one to six drinks a week; those who consumed seven to 13 drinks a week; and heavy drinkers who consumed 14 or more drinks a week.

    Factors taken into account were age, sex, race, smoking status, physical activity BMI, cholesterol, and diabetes. Comparing moderate drinkers with non-drinkers, the drinkers were 1.5 times more likely to develop stage 1 hypertension and twice as likely to develop stage 2 hypertension. Heavy drinkers were 2.5 times more likely than non-drinkers to develop severe hypertension.

    Dr Marcin Kowalski directs cardiac electrophysiology at Staten Island University Hospital in New York City. He told Health24 that the study “gives us more insight to the negative effect of alcohol on the cardiovascular system.” He continued that Americans drink too much and “should be encouraged in the general population and especially in patients at higher risk for developing hypertension”.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Working At Amazon Takes Mental Health Toll On Some Employees

    Working At Amazon Takes Mental Health Toll On Some Employees

    The Daily Beast investigated mental health emergency calls made from Amazon warehouses over a five-year span.

    Working conditions at Amazon warehouses may be so poor that they are negatively impacting the mental health of employees—evidenced by 189 emergency calls logged from Amazon warehouses over five years to report suicidal employees and other mental health emergencies. 

    The calls were made from 46 warehouses—about a quarter of the warehouses run in the United States by Amazon, according to reporting by The Daily Beast. Information from the other warehouses was not available, but the pattern at the 46 warehouses suggests that many other emergencies likely took place at Amazon facilities. 

    One call in July 2018 from a man in Ohio highlight the issues at hand. A sheriff’s report about the incident reads:

    “With all the demands his employer has placed on him and things he’s dealing with in life [sic] is becoming too much and considering hurting himself.” He has been “with Amazon for over a year and is frustrated with his employment because he felt he was lied to by Amazon at his orientation. He keeps saying the company told him they valued his employment and would be treated as if he mattered and not just a number.”

    However, that promise is at odds with reports that have emerged from Amazon warehouses, where employees are reportedly carefully monitored right down to their timed bathroom breaks. 

    Jace Crouch, a former employee in Florida, said that the environment in the warehouses can exacerbate pre-existing mental health conditions. 

    “It’s this isolating colony of hell where people having breakdowns is a regular occurrence,” Crouch said. He added that it was “mentally taxing to do the same task super fast for 10-hour shifts, four or five days a week.”

    Amazon responded in a statement that the Daily Beast report was a generalization, and didn’t “take into account the total of our associate population, hours worked, or our growing network.”

    “The physical and mental well-being of our associates is our top priority, and we are proud of both our efforts and overall success in this area,” the company said in a statement. “We provide comprehensive medical care starting on day one so employees have access to the care when they need it most, 24-hour a day free and confidential counseling services, and various leave and medical accommodation options covering both mental and physical health concerns.”

    However, Nick Veasley, 41, who became suicidal while working at Amazon, said that those benefits do little to offset the work environment. Although he was initially excited about the pay and benefits provided by Amazon, he often felt his thoughts spiral at work. 

    “I had so much on my mind that the quietness of standing in one spot and doing my job, would just let my mind run,” he said. “Usually I can get myself out of a problem but I couldn’t do it working at Amazon. I felt like I had a thousand pounds wrapped around my ankle and it kept dragging me down and down and down, and there was no way out.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Sober Home Standards Could Change Under New California Bill

    Sober Home Standards Could Change Under New California Bill

    Recovery advocate Ryan Hampton calls the bill “a good first step.”

    Each year, thousands of Americans pay to live in sober homes, but the residences go largely unregulated.

    The high potential for profit and low oversight has led to an unscrupulous reputation for sober homes across the nation, including in California and Florida where state investigators have been looking into allegations of abuse and other criminal acts by people operating these facilities. 

    Now, a new bill introduced in California aims to set minimum standards for sober homes in hopes of cleaning up the industry—at least a little bit. Democratic Assemblyman Tom Daly introduced the bill, Assembly Bill 1779.

    “Despite the growing death toll from opioid and alcohol abuse and addiction, California lacks a uniform set of standards to guide individuals and their loved ones in identifying safe, reliable housing accommodations that will be conducive to recovery,” Daly said in a statement reported by The Daily Bulletin.

    “AB 1779 will enable California to provide accurate and up-to-date information… And by adopting best practices, including minimum standards for recovery residences, California will take a significant step towards increasing the number of residences that are safe for people in recovery and for the communities where they are located.”

    The bill would require the California Department of Health Care Services to establish best practices, like keeping the opioid overdose reversal drug, Narcan, on site. Sober homes that receive state funding through public health care or court systems would need to meet these requirements. 

    Ryan Hampton, who advocates for change in the sober home industry, said that the bill is a good “first step.” However, others in the industry said that the bill would not do enough, especially since most sober homes do not receive state funding. 

    “[Daly] really needs to take a strong look at the area where there’s significant abuse, the residential treatment facilities that are being run by private operators and funded through private insurance,” said Orange County’s District Attorney Todd Spitzer, who has been suing sober home operators for operating medical facilities without proper licensing and supervision. 

    “One of the biggest complaints we get are about private facilities targeting people across country, bringing them here, then tossing them out when the insurance benefits run out. That’s not happening when government funding is involved. They’re very distinct and different entities, which is why my office is pursuing the private side. We have people who are ripping off the system.”

    Laurie Girand pushes for changes to the treatment industry with Advocates for Responsible Treatment. She was not impressed with the bill. 

    “Voluntary certification standards… Same old song,” she said. “This is health care, not vitamin supplements. When are we going to start treating it like health care?”

    However, Daly’s spokesperson David Miller insisted that the bill was important. 

    “If a home is in reality a ‘flop house’ for drug activity, it should be shut down,” he said. 

    View the original article at thefix.com