WASHINGTON — A top public health official warned Thursday the nation’s opioid epidemic is showing no signs of abating.
“It is one of the few public health problems that is getting worse instead of better,” said Dr. Debra Houry, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Injury Prevention and Control.
Houry and public health officials testifying at a Senate hearing described an addiction crisis that has spiraled so out of control that it is far beyond the scope of any particular agency to address.
“We need all hands on deck,” said Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health.
Officials from four federal health agencies delivered their dire assessment of the opioid epidemic during the first in a series of hearings before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.
“The opioid crisis is tearing our communities apart, tearing families apart, and posing an enormous challenge to health providers and law enforcement officials,” said the committee’s chairman, Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn.
More than 11 million Americans misused prescription opioids in 2016, nearly 1 million used heroin, and 2.1 million had an opioid use disorder due to prescription opioids or heroin, according to the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
Opioid epidemic 'getting worse instead of better,' public health officials warn
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