Tag: News

Inside Burt Reynolds' Addiction Struggles & Road To Recovery

The late icon spoke openly about his battles with addiction throughout his life.

When Burt Reynolds died on September 6 at the age of 82, many who worked with the iconic star expressed great sadness at his passing.

With hit movies like Smokey and the Bandit and Hooper, Reynolds became one of the biggest sex symbols of the ‘70s, but his life and career became increasingly troubled in the following decades. (His career ended on a high note with the independent gem The Last Movie Star, and he was about to film a role in the latest Quentin Tarantino movie Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.)

One of the tribulations of Reynolds’ life was his addiction to a controversial sleeping pill, which he spoke about openly. In the early nineties, Reynolds confessed he was addicted to Halcion, which he got hooked on when recovering from an injury he suffered during a movie shoot.

“I broke my jaw and shattered my temporomandibular joint,” he recalled. “The pain was worse than a migraine. It is like having an army of people inside your head trying to get out through ears, eyes, your nose. It never stops.”

Reynolds was hooked on Halcion for over four years. He told TV Guide he was taking up to 50 Halcion pills a day, and he went into a coma when he tried to stop cold turkey.

“Doctors told me if I had taken one more pill I would have died.” (In 1992, Halcion came under scrutiny from the Food and Drug Administration, and it was also banned in Great Britain.)

Even after having a near-death experience, Reynolds didn’t enter rehab at the time. He told People, “It was very important to me not to be portrayed as a drug addict.”

He wrote in his autobiography that he didn’t take another Halcion after he regained consciousness, but he fell into addiction again in 2009, becoming addicted to prescription pills after he had back surgery.

Reynolds finally surrendered and checked into rehab that September.

“I felt that in spite of the fact that I am supposedly a big tough guy, I couldn’t beat prescription drugs on my own. I’ve worked hard to get off of them and really hope other people will realize they need to seek professional help, rather than ignoring the problem or trying to get off of the prescriptions on their own.”

View the original article at thefix.com

11 September 2018
Lil Xan Says Mac Miller's Overdose Death Made Him Want To Quit Music

The 22-year-old rapper discussed how Miller’s death has impacted him during a recent podcast interview.

The death of hip-hop artist Mac Miller (born Malcolm James McCormick) has left many of his fans devastated, including fellow rapper Lil Xan, who has claimed that he will retire in the wake of his peer’s passing.

In a recent appearance on a podcast, Leanos states that the news of McCormick’s death left him “crying in [his] apartment” and unwilling to “make music no more” [sic]. McCormick’s death, from what authorities have described as an apparent overdose, also gave Leanos pause to consider his own drug use and mental health issues, which he said he would be addressing in rehab if he did not have upcoming tour dates.

Speaking live on Adam22’s podcast No Jumper on September 8—one day after McCormick was found dead in his home in Studio City, California—Leanos said that he was overwhelmed by the news. “I’ve been crying in my apartment, ‘Mac didn’t die, Mac didn’t overdose,”” he said.

He also recalled the last time he saw McCormick, which happened to be at the rapper’s final performance at the Hotel Café in Los Angeles shortly before his death. “Before I left, he was like, ‘Be safe,’” said Leanos. “People say that, you know: ‘Be safe.’ But he grabbed me, and he pulled me back, and he was like, ‘No, I mean, BE SAFE.’ That almost made me cry. That’s my idol right there. I keep thinking about that—how it resonated in my head, how those were his last words.”

According to Leanos, the experience of McCormick’s words, followed by the news of his death, left him unwilling to continue his music career. “When your hero dies, f—k that s—t,” he said. “I don’t want to make music no more.” After the completion of his current recording contract, Leanos claimed that he planned to retire, though he did not elaborate on this particular decision.

McCormick’s death also put Leanos in a reflective mood regarding his own substance use. His use of Xanax—the drug that gave him his stage name—and opiates like Norco have been well-publicized in the past, but in his No Jumper interview, Leanos suggested that he continued to struggle with sobriety.

“I want to get sober now, completely sober, but it’s so hard,” he told Adam22, whose real name is Adam Grandmaison. “I just want to be off everything. I want to be like a normal person. If I didn’t have a tour coming up, I would be in rehab right now.”

View the original article at thefix.com

11 September 2018
San Francisco Unveils Safe Injection Site Prototype

Alongside accommodations for drug use, the facilities will offer a range of services geared toward giving clients a chance to get well.

With the city of San Francisco now closer than ever to opening the nation’s first supervised injection facility (SIF), it unveiled a prototype to show how a real facility will operate.

The public was invited to view the demonstration, titled Safer Inside, at Glide Memorial Church in the city’s Tenderloin neighborhood from August 28-31.

San Francisco is not the only city that has fielded the possibility of opening a supervised injection facility, which is prohibited under federal law. However, that’s closer to reality than ever, after final revisions of the bill (AB186) to allow the city to establish a SIF were approved by the state Assembly. AB186 now awaits the signature of Governor Jerry Brown.

The goal of opening such a site is to keep drug use off the streets, while giving people a safe place to use.

“I refuse to accept what we see on our streets—the needles, the open drug use, the human suffering caused by addiction—as the new status quo,” said Mayor London Breed in a statement. “Safe injection sites are a proven, evidence-based approach to solving this public health crisis.”

The San Francisco Chronicle offered a glimpse inside the Safer Inside demonstration. “Clients” who wish to use the facility register upon entering, and are then led to the injection room. They are provided with a “harm reduction kit” containing clean syringes, disinfecting wipes, cotton balls, tourniquets, and “cookers” to cook the drug.

They may inject at a table facing a small mirror that will allow staff to observe from a distance. “This way, we can check in on them without actually having to invade their space and their privacy,” said Kenneth Kim, clinical director at Glide. Afterwards, clients are ushered to a “chill-out room” where they can ride out their highs.

Despite the accommodations for drug use, public health officials are most proud that these facilities will offer a range of services geared toward giving clients a chance to get well. Services include meal services, showers, dental care, and mental health and medical referrals, according to the SF Chronicle.

“The readiness to take that next step or maybe go to recovery can start in a place where there’s dignity and respect and relationships,” said Anel Muller, who designed the prototype facility. “That’s not something that will happen overnight, but once you’re creating those great foundations, it becomes much easier to talk about a lot of different things.”

The greatest hurdle San Francisco officials may face is the federal government. Last Monday (August 27), US Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein reiterated the federal government’s stance on SIFs—declaring them “very dangerous” and that they will “only make the opioid crisis worse.”

“Because federal law clearly prohibits injection sites, cities and counties should expect the Department of Justice to meet the opening of any injection site with swift and aggressive action,” said Rosenstein.

View the original article at thefix.com

11 September 2018
Are Moms With Opioid Addiction At Heightened Risk For Overdose?

A new study examined pregnant women and new moms with opioid use disorder.

After finding out she was pregnant with her second child while in a Massachusetts prison, Katie Raftery entered treatment for heroin use. She stayed seven months, until her son was born. It wasn’t until he was about six weeks old that she began to feel the familiar urges to return to using.

According to the Sarasota Herald Tribune, a new study shows that women who use opioids, like Raftery, are at greater risk of an overdose in the year following their child’s birth.

Rather than return to using, Raftery was able to use her insurance coverage and reach out to her doctor to ask for buprenorphine, a medication that can treat opioid use disorder. But not all women in the country have the ability to take similar actions.

According to the Herald Tribune, in states that do not offer expanded Medicaid, low-income women lose their insurance coverage eight weeks after giving birth. Addiction experts say this is concerning, as it makes a relapse during postpartum depression and opioid cravings more likely.

“As a whole, women with substance use disorders do quite well during pregnancy, due in large extent to access to care, insurance coverage and attention from social services,” Mishka Terplan, an obstetrics and gynecology physician at Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine, told the newspaper. “Where things fall apart is postpartum. We actually abandon women after delivery.”

Terplan served as the co-author of the study published last month. During the course of the study, researchers kept track of more than 4,000 women with opioid use disorder in Massachusetts, for the duration of the year before and after giving birth.

The study’s results indicated that deaths from opioid overdoses decrease during pregnancy, but increase in the seven to 12 months following birth. Since all of the women involved in the study resided in Massachusetts, insurance coverage was not a factor.

Davida Schiff, lead author of the study and a physician at Massachusetts General Hospital, tells the Herald Journal that sustaining care for women well after childbirth is vital.

“Pregnancy seems to be a time for change. Women tend to make healthier decisions during pregnancy. So, for women with an opioid addiction, it can be a motivating moment,” she said.

“We should capitalize on the emotions women feel during pregnancy, and sustain their care or enhance it during the postpartum period, which is arguably the most challenging.”

The Herald Journal states that while the opioid epidemic has hit the country hard as a whole, it has impacted subgroups, like pregnant women and new moms, especially hard.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found that between 1999 and 2014, the number of pregnant women who used opioids more than quadrupled.

View the original article at thefix.com

11 September 2018
Woman Caught Trying To Smuggle Cocaine In Heels For Online Charmer

The woman believed she was just smuggling artifacts for a promising love interest.

Before a charlatan offering an internet romance lured her into smuggling 2 kilograms of cocaine in her gold high heels, Denise Marie Woodrum once dreamed of becoming a nun.

But after crippling medical debt, a difficult surgery, a tough divorce, the loss of her job and a long battle with depression, the Missouri woman’s devout faith alone wasn’t enough to get her through.

Maybe, she thought, her new lover—a mysterious online charmer known as Hendrik Cornelius—was.

Instead, the short-lived internet romance with the mystery Lothario she never actually met landed Woodrum in an Australian prison. She was reportedly sentenced last week to 7.5 years behind bars for her role in the smuggling scheme, a baffling illicit plot she claimed she knew nothing about.

“There are fraudsters out there who are relying on women who are vulnerable,” said her lawyer, Rebecca Neil, according to the Sydney Morning Herald. “She was groomed to provide a financial gain for this person, Hendrik Cornelius, whatever person or persons it was behind this identity.”

The series of personal dramas that ended in the Aussie hoosegow started years earlier in California. Woodrum had been living with her husband and working as a grade school teacher when her marriage collapsed, according to the Washington Post.

She moved to Montana and into her father’s condo, but her life continued on a downward slide until she found herself saddled with medical debt and selling vitamins at the mall.

Then in the spring of 2017, she finally saw hope, a desperate grasp at something new that played out over the course of hundreds of text messages.

“Can you promise you will never leave me?” Woodrum wrote in a message, according to the Sydney paper. “You are my Only and First True Family!!!”

It may have seemed that way at the time, but when Woodrum found herself at the airport with a key of coke and some hard questions to answer, Cornelius was nowhere to be found.

The then-50-year-old started her ill-fated smuggling run in Missouri, then flew to Texas, then Trindad and Tobago, then Suriname. Then, she hopped back to Trinidad and Tobago, then Miami, then Los Angeles and finally Sydney.

But when she touched down in the harbor city, her bags were flagged for additional inspection—and a swab test and X-rays found a heel full of blow.

“How much did they put in the shoes?” Woodrum allegedly asked while the felonious footwear went through the scanner. “Sorry, just talking to myself,” she added.

Despite that muttered question, Woodrum consistently told the courts she’d been duped, and that she thought she was just bringing artifacts for the man she’d never met.

District Court Judge Penelope Wass didn’t buy it, deeming her story “at times unbelievable” and noting the apparent lack of contrition.

“I am being asked to accept that unknown to the offender the relationship was not genuine and created by the internet to dupe the offender,” Wass said, according to BuzzFeed. “There is a limit to which even her own expressions show she is genuinely remorseful for her conduct, rather than the position she now finds herself in.”

And so, on Thursday, the New South Wales District Court sentenced Woodrum to a maximum of 7.5 years in the pen. She’ll be eligible for parole in 2022.

View the original article at thefix.com

10 September 2018
Dolores O’Riordan's Alcohol-Related Cause of Death Revealed

The Cranberries singer’s body was found in a London hotel in January.

The Cranberries singer Dolores O’Riordan had a blood alcohol level four times the legal driving limit at the time of her death, according to coroner’s inquest, AP News reports.

A police officer reported to the inquest at Westminster Coroner’s Court that on January 15, O’Riordan, 46, was found in a London hotel submerged in a bathtub in her pajamas. There was no note and no evidence of any self-harm. As such, the AP states, the inquest determined that O’Riordan’s death was accidental and caused by alcohol consumption.

In Britain, inquests are usually held after a sudden, violent or unexplained death. The purpose, according to the AP, is to determine the facts of the circumstances surrounding the death.

In O’Riordan’s room, authorities discovered five mini alcohol bottles as well as a bottle of champagne. In addition to O’Riordan’s high blood alcohol content, “therapeutic” amounts of prescription medications were also found in her body, the AP states.

“There’s no evidence that this was anything other than an accident,” coroner Shirley Radcliffe stated.

Prior to her drowning, O’Riordan had reportedly struggled with her physical and mental health. The AP reported that in 2017, the band had to end their world tour early due to her back issues.

In interviews, she had also spoken about being sexually abused during her childhood, as well as struggling with depression and bipolar disorder.

After the iconic singer’s death, Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar stated that “for anyone who grew up in Ireland in the 1990s, Dolores O’Riordan was the voice of a generation.”

After the inquest, The Cranberries released a statement on Twitter.

“Today we continue to struggle to come to terms with what happened,” it read. “Our heartfelt condolences go out to Dolores’ children and family and our thoughts are with them today. Dolores will live on eternally in her music. To see how much of a positive impact she had on people’s lives has been a source of great comfort to us. We’d like to say thank you to all of our fans for the outpouring of messages and continued support during this very difficult time.”

View the original article at thefix.com

10 September 2018
Elon Musk's Apparent Pot-Smoking Sparks Backlash

An ex-Tesla employee who was reportedly fired after testing positive for THC says seeing Musk smoke pot was “like a slap in the face.”

In a rambling two-hour conversation on The Joe Rogan Experience podcast, Tesla founder Elon Musk apparently toked a spliff during the live show, a move that fed concerns about his increasingly erratic behavior.

The long-winded chat between the business magnate and the comedian covered everything from robots to web presence, but it was a short exchange about cannabis near the end of the show that drew the most attention.

“Is that a joint, or is it a cigar?” Musk asked when Rogan pulled out the ganja. “It’s marijuana inside of tobacco,” the host replied, before asking if Musk had ever tried it.

“Yeah, I think I tried one once,” he said. Rogan seemed skeptical, and asked if stockholders prevented him from toking.

“I mean, it’s legal right?” Musk asked. “It’s totally legal,” Rogan said. (The show tapes in California.)

To some, the move may have seemed hypocritical, since Tesla drug tests at least some of its employees, according to Market Watch.

Crystal Guardado, a former Tesla employee, told Bloomberg News that she was fired from the company after testing positive for THC.

“It was just like a slap in the face to me and my son,” she said. “Elon Musk is just smoking it out in the open, knowing that he uses his very vague drug policy as a way to fire people that are a threat to him.”

But even if he didn’t have to pass a drug test, there seems to have been some consequences for the CEO.

One day after the show, Tesla stock went down 9%, closing at 6%, according to Vox. This may not have been just about the on-air pot use, though, as the company generally suffered a trying week.

That same day, two top executives announced their departures, continuing the string of turnovers. Also on Friday, reports began surfacing that the Air Force had begun looking into the alleged post use.

Earlier this year, Musk sparked speculation about his love for cannabis when he tweeted about taking the company private at $420 a share. Not long after, though, he specifically shot down the idea of cannabis use and dismissed any efforts to read into the number.

“It seemed like better karma at $420 than at $419,” he told the New York Times. “But I was not on weed, to be clear. Weed is not helpful for productivity. There’s a reason for the word ‘stoned.’ You just sit there like a stone on weed.”

View the original article at thefix.com

10 September 2018
Mac Miller Dies At Age 26

Miller was found dead in his home of an apparent drug overdose.

Rapper Mac Miller was found dead in his home in Studio City, California on Friday (September 7). The Los Angeles County Department of Medical Examiner-Coroner pronounced Miller dead at 11:51 am, People confirms, and a source says his death was caused by cardiac arrest following a drug overdose.

“Malcolm McCormick, known and adored by fans as Mac Miller, has tragically passed away at the age of 26,” his family wrote in a media press release. “He was a bright light in this world for his family, friends and fans. Thank you for your prayers. Please respect our privacy. There are no further details as to the cause of his death at this time.”

Miller was born in Pittsburgh and struck fame at age 18 with his fourth mixtape, K.I.D.S., in 2010. He was in a public relationship with pop star Ariana Grande for about two years until they broke up earlier this year.

Just hours before he died, Miller was posting videos of himself in a recording studio on Instagram.

He had struggled with substance abuse throughout his life. His most recent episode came just a week after his public breakup with Grande when he was arrested for drunk driving. He ran into a power pole and fled, but law enforcement was able to match the plates to his Mercedes-Benz G-Wagon and charged him with DUI and hit-and-run.

“I made a stupid mistake. I’m a human being,” Miller explained at the time. “But it was the best thing that could have happened. Best thing that could have happened. I needed that. I needed to run into that light pole and literally have the whole thing stop.”

Fellow musicians openly mourned Miller’s passing on social media.

“I dont know what to say Mac Miller took me on my second tour ever. But beyond helping me launch my career he was one of the sweetest guys I ever knew,” Chance the Rapper tweeted. “Great man. I loved him for real. Im completely broken. God bless him.”

Post Malone also shared condolences.

“God fucking dammit. You were such an incredible person. You changed so many lives. Had so much love in your heart,” Malone wrote on Twitter, “You inspired me throughout highschool, and I wouldn’t be where I was today without you. Never a more kind and sincere and beautiful person. I fucking love you mac.”

View the original article at thefix.com

10 September 2018
Kim Kardashian On A Mission To Free More Non-Violent Drug Offenders

Following her initial success, the reality TV star is gearing up to convince the Trump administration to do it again on a larger scale.

Kim Kardashian West managed to commute the life sentence of Alice Marie Johnson, a non-violent drug offender, with a single meeting at the White House.

The 37-year-old reality television star is back to present the case of Chris Young, 30, who received life in prison for drug possession after three strikes.

However, this time she is expanding the scope, calling for a systematic change to stop drug criminals from receiving extreme sentences at a listening session headed by Jared Kushner.

“It started with Ms. Alice, but looking at her and seeing the faces and learning the stories of the men and women I’ve met inside prisons I knew I couldn’t stop at just one,” West wrote on a Twitter post with photos of the meeting. “It’s time for REAL systemic change.”

West spoke about Young’s case on the Wrongful Conviction podcast, sharing that Young has already been in prison for 10 years at this point.

“Yesterday I had a call with a gentleman that’s in prison for a drug case, got life. It’s so unfair… It was just a crazy—there’s so many people like him,” she told the podcast’s host, Jason Flom. “His prior conviction to get him to his three strikes was marijuana and then marijuana with less than half a gram of cocaine.”

Summing up all the drugs that Young was sentenced for, Flom calculated that the total weight of all the drugs Young was serving a life sentence for weighed less than three pennies.

West also revealed in the interview that the judge who presided over Young’s case, Kevin Sharp, actually stepped down from his position because he felt the life sentence was “so wrong … [Sharp] was like, ‘I’m gonna make this right. I’m gonna step down and I’m gonna fight to get him out.

West has reportedly been in touch with Kushner regarding minimum sentences for drug offenders. This new battle is likely to be long-fought, unlike her first success in freeing Johnson.

“I spoke to the president … He let me know what was going to happen [with Johnson] and he was going to sign the papers right then and there and she could be released that day,” she recounted. “I didn’t know, does that happen right away? Is there a process? What is it? So he was going to let her go. He told me she can leave today.”

View the original article at thefix.com

10 September 2018
Bees May Become "Addicted" To Pesticides, Study Claims

The possibility for an addictive response underscores the concern over global use of the controversial insecticide.

Researchers in London have found that bumblebees may develop a preference for food that is laced with pesticide that can echo the addictive effects of nicotine on humans.

The study looked at a class of pesticide from the neonicotinoid family, a controversial form of insecticide used in farming that some scientists have claimed can be harmful to bees. When offered options for food—one with the pesticide and one without—bees initially preferred the latter, but upon consuming the chemically-treated food, they returned to it with greater frequency.

The possibility for an addictive response underscores concern over global use of neonicotinoids, which were banned by the European Union in 2018.

The study, conducted by researchers from London’s Imperial College and Queen Mary University, was intended to reproduce real foraging behavior by bumblebees, including social cues used in that activity.

To determine if the introduction of neonicotinoids into the bees’ food sources, 10 colonies of bees were introduced to several sucrose feeders, each containing a solution with varying degrees (in parts per billion) of a neonicotinoid called thiamethoxam.

Over a period of 10 days, the researchers found that bees initially preferred what IFL Science called the “pure” solution, which contained no pesticide. But once a bee consumed a solution that contained thiamethoxam, it would return to that solution more regularly and avoid the pure solution. Changing the position of the feeders also appeared to have no impact on the bees’ preference for the pesticide-laced solution.

The researchers’ comparison between the bees’ reaction to the neonicotinoid and human response to nicotine is not accidental: as study lead author Richard Gill noted in a statement: “neonicotinoids” target nerve receptors in insects that are similar to receptors targeted by nicotine in mammals.”

As Texas A&M’s AgriLife Extension Service posted on its site, the term “neonicotinoid” is translated literally as “new nicotine-like insecticide.”

Though agriculturalists and scientists are split on how neonicotinoids affect bees, they cause paralysis and eventual death in the bugs they are intended to repel, such as aphids or root-feeding grubs. Unlike contact pesticides, they are absorbed by the plant and transported through its system, and will remain in the plant for many weeks.

And while studies have shown that the pesticide class is less harmful to birds and mammals, others have suggested that it can affect a variety of crucial foraging skills for bees, including motor functions and navigation.

Some have even linked the increase in the population of bees in the city over those located in rural areas to the use of such pesticides. The potential for harm to bees is among the key reasons why the European Union chose to ban the use of neonicotinoids in agriculture, save for permanent greenhouses, in 2018.

However, in his statement, Gill wrote, “Whilst neonicotinoids are controversial, if the effects of replacements on non-target insects are not understood, then I believe it is sensible that we take advantage of current knowledge and further studies to provide guidance for using neonicotinoids more responsibly, rather than necessarily an outright ban.”

View the original article at thefix.com

7 September 2018