A story of recovery and hope — and a look at solutions to the opioid crisis
If you know someone is suffering from a substance use disorder, text "HELP" to 833234, or visit www.helplineIL.org.
If you know someone is suffering from a substance use disorder, text "HELP" to 833234, or visit www.helplineIL.org.
All this week we are focusing on fentanyl. We begin with the writer and journalist Sam Quinones, author of “Dreamland: The True Tale of America’s Opiate Epidemic” and “The Least of Us: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth.”
Judge Jodi Thomas presides over HART, which stands for "Helping Achieve Recovery Together." It’s an opioid-specific program, and one of two drug recovery court dockets in Franklin County, which includes Columbus.
Donald Hutson is one of more than 430 inmates who have overdosed in state prisons since May 2017, according to internal data from the Missouri Department of Corrections. While there are many ways drugs are smuggled into prisons, DOC employees say internal corruption is a key part of the problem.
The area around Columbus Ohio has been hit hard by the opioid epidemic, and judges say courtrooms are jammed with misdemeanor cases that are tied to addiction. Now they hope a treatment clinic in an unlikely location will be part of the solution.