Imagine the terrible news of a plane crash. A flight out of Portland went down over Buzzards Bay, MA killing all ninety-two passengers on board. We’d watch the news with sadness. The very next day, the same news network reports yet another plane crash, this time out of Denver. All ninety-two souls aboard were lost. Hmmm. Sad and yet very odd. The same number as the crash out of Portland. The next day, the same news...ninety-two dead. The next day, and the next…and the next. Every day, ninety-two innocent people are dying. The entire nation would erupt and demand reform in airline travel. The FAA would become subject to congressional hearings and fierce scrutiny. This would be the lead story on every media outlet on earth.

Yet, every day in this country, ninety-two people overdose on opioids. That’s 53,000 deaths per year, 378 in Maine in 2016, an average of over one (usually young) person dying per day. When the Ebola virus hit it 2014, the nation suffered just one fatality and yet spent one BILLION dollars on the “battle.” The opioid epidemic had received a fraction of that support, stated Gordon Smith, Esq., Executive Vice President of Maine Medical Association, who stood at our podium last Friday and provided the startling statistics, which continued: in 2016, 1032 babies were born in Maine with neonatal drug dependence; 80% of heroin users began with prescribed medications; the United States represents 6% of the world population, yet uses 80% of the world’s opioids; Maine is the #1 state in the nation (per capita) in medical providers who prescribe opioids. There’s no doubt that the terrifying stats could go on and on. Is there a solution? Is there time and money to fight this raging war? And how do we fight it? By going after drug users? Dealers? Prescribing doctors?  

Gordon has made his career in working with doctors, legislators and the public in dealing with health issues. This most recent battle has become a rallying cry for so many entities, from those in the State House to those manning the rehab centers and hospitals around the state. A new law, which took effect at the beginning of this year, is a good start, containing language that delineates opioid prescription use between acute and chronic pain use, requires prescribers and, in many cases, the pharmacy, to check a state-wide database for a history of substance abuse. It also rolls in language from a 2016 law that limits opioid prescriptions to more than 100 MME’s (morphine milligram equivalents) per day. This requires the tapering of drugs, which can certainly be problematic for patients who have grown tolerant of up to 4000 MME’s per day, a level that would instantaneously kill a non-addicted patient.

With just one detox center having just ten beds currently up and running (in Portland), the crisis is still very much a public danger, if not a catastrophe. Gordon, along with 15 other civic leaders and legislators, are delving into the problem and attempting to find expedited solutions, but the opioid crisis continues, with those "planes dropping from the sky," like clockwork, every single day.

 

 

(Photo: President Laura Young, Gordon Smith and Rusty Atwood.)