12 Things You Didn’t Know About Addiction
12 Things You Didn’t Know About Addiction When heroin went from legal to requiring a doctor's prescription in 1914, desperate users began scavenging junk metal to support their habit - and...
12 Things You Didn’t Know About Addiction
- When heroin went from legal to requiring a doctor’s prescription in 1914, desperate users began scavenging junk metal to support their habit – and the term “junkies” was born.
- 4 out of 5 new heroin users started out misusing prescriptions pain killers. In a recent survey, 94% of respondents said they chose heroin because prescription pills were “more expensive and harder to obtain.”
- 21.5 million people over the age of 12 had a substance use disorder in 2014. For 1.9 million of those, prescription painkillers were involved. Another 586,000 were using heroin.
- The US has 5% of the world’s population but consumes 80% of its opioid painkillers.
- More people now die in the US from drug overdoses than from car crashes. Prescription painkillers and heroin account for 63% of these overdose deaths.
- More than 65% of people in prisons and jails meet medical criteria for substance abuse or addiction.
- Only 11% of inmates struggling with addiction disorders receive any kind of treatment.
- The government spends almost $500 every year on addiction and substance abuse, but only 2 cents of each dollar goes to prevention and treatment.
- More than 2. 5 Million seniors aged 65-79 qualify as having an alcohol use disorder. By 2020, that number is expected to double.
- A study of more than 300K woman that lasted over 11 years found that the risk of breast cancer quadruples with each additional daily glass of (10g) of alcohol.
- Playing Tetris for just 3 minuets help decrease craving strength for things like food, sex and drugs by up to 20%.
- 70% -8% of people with diseases such as high blood pressure and diabetes receive treatment. Only 1 in 10 of those struggling with addiction – also chronic disease- get any kind of treatment.
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