The Wednesday Weekly Addiction + Recovery News Clips - Oct. 18, 2023
The Wednesday Weekly is a collaboration of Sober Linings Playbook and Recovery in the Middle Ages Podcast.
NOTE: Sober Linings Playbook is a personal website. Any views or opinions expressed herein belong solely to the website owner and do not represent those of individuals or organizations the owner may be associated with in a professional or personal capacity, unless explicitly stated. This website offers no advice, products or services.
Highlights
National
Alcohol-free beer sales eclipse growth of sales for alcohol | 15 Best movies about alcohol use disorder
State and Local
Oregon legislature to tackle addiction, treatment in special session | New California law aims to force people to treatment for addiction, mental health
Studies/Research in the News
CDC reports female alcohol-related deaths are on the rise | Should red wine be cut from the Mediterranean diet?
Opinion
Maia Szalavitz: Can cannabis be part of addiction treatment? | Denver Gazette op ed piece warns against safe consumption sites
Add a Comment
Have a comment about a story? A suggestion about changes to the Wednesday Weekly format? Did we miss an important story? Leave a comment. Anonymous comments welcome.
National State/Local Studies/Research Opinion Reviews Comments
National
Alcohol-free beer sales shoot up 32% - compared to 3% growth of real booze - as Gen Z increasingly moderate their drinking
Sales of non-alcoholic beer in the US have averaged 31% growth in last four year. Heineken, Budweiser, Corona and Guinness all now offer 0% beers. Experts said mounting trend was being driven by younger Americans.
Daily Mail - Oct. 13, 2023
It’s like trying to quit smoking’: why are 1 in 7 of us addicted to ultra-processed foods?
Ultra processed foods, which we know are extremely harmful to health, are designed to be hyper-palatable and overeaten. Now researchers believe they are not just hard to resist – they are actually addictive. An analysis of 281 studies in 36 countries by scientists from the US, Spain and Brazil, published in the BMJ, found that 14% of adults and 12% of children have a food addiction, and the food they are addicted to is ultra-processed.
The Guardian - Oct. 12, 2023
Robin Williams' friends lay bare brutal truth about his 'monster' drug addiction
Comedian 'couldn't go on stage without blow' and once 'accidentally' snorted an entire GRAM of cocaine. The late actor struggled with substance abuse in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Fellow comics have shared shocking anecdotes from his cocaine addiction. Williams's life is put under the microscope in Vice TV's Dark Side of Comedy.
Daily Mail - Oct. 10, 2023
How Jelly Roll became the new (tattooed) face of country
Beyond his music, which speaks frankly about his past as a drug addict and a convicted felon — and about the faith journey he says took him out of those troubles — Jelly Roll’s way with people has helped make him 2023’s breakout country act, with sold-out tour dates, hundreds of millions of streams and nominations for five prizes, including new artist of the year, at November’s Country Music Assn. Awards.
Los Angeles Times - Oct. 10, 2023
15 Best Movies About Addiction and Alcoholism
The following movies are difficult to watch, and while the descriptions here won't be graphic, the subject itself may be disturbing to some. They are nevertheless movies worth bringing up, as addiction is a human condition that affects many in various ways; sometimes as an exercise in empathy, sometimes as a cautionary tale, and sometimes as a bit of both.
Collider - Oct. 8, 2023
National State and Local Studies in the News Opinion Reviews Comments
State / Local
California deems addiction treatment, housing as mental health, seeks $4.7B bond
California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a package of two bills in Los Angeles, aimed at reducing the state’s homelessness crisis. The first, the Behavioral Health Services Act, which expands replaces the Mental Health Services Act and expands mental health services overall to include substance abuse treatment and housing, and the second, which puts forward a ballot measure for voters to approve a $4.7 billion bond for funding said services and housing expansion.
The Center Square - Oct. 13, 2023
Oregon lawmakers prep to tackle drug addiction in 2024 session
Oregon lawmakers want to look at the state’s drug addiction crisis – and seek solutions – from all angles before the next legislative session starts in February. That work starts in earnest at 1 p.m. Wednesday, when the new Joint Interim Committee on Addiction and Community Safety Response meets for the first time. Legislative leaders announced the eight-member committee in September amid concerns about drug addiction, deadly overdoses and what role Oregon’s drug decriminalization law plays after voters in 2020 passed Measure 110, which also put marijuana revenue toward addiction programs throughout the state.
Oregon Capital Chronicle - Oct. 13, 2023
Oregon decriminalization reveals possible solutions and challenges to addressing addiction
It’s been more than two and half years since a first-of-its-kind law went into effect in Oregon that decriminalized small possession of most drugs, including opioids and methamphetamines. Stephanie Sy reports from Portland on what’s working and what’s not working with a law that advocates hoped would change the paradigm around drug enforcement.
PBS - Oct. 13, 2023
New York: Will NY ban addictive social media for children?
NY seeks to require parental consent for children to use algorithm-curated social media platforms. New bills would also ban social media notifications overnight and let parents limit the amount of social media time per day for minors.
lohud - Oct. 13, 2023
California: Why It's So Hard for San Diego Providers to Deliver More Addiction Treatment Beds
Desperate to supply more treatment beds, San Diego substance use providers face a myriad of challenges to expand their services. Treatment and detox providers desperate to expand at a time when overdose deaths are spiking also keep running up against all sorts of barriers: property restrictions, bureaucratic red tape and a competitive real estate market.
Voice of San Diego - Oct. 12, 2023
New California law aims to force people with mental illness or addiction to get help
More Californians with untreated mental illness and addiction issues could be detained against their will and forced into treatment under a new law signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom, a move to help overhaul the state's mental health system and address its growing homelessness crisis.
ABC - Oct. 10, 2023
Oregon: Readers Respond to Efforts to Raise Oregonians Out of Addiction
The words “success story” and “Measure 110″ are not typically linked in the popular imagination. Last week, WW’s cover story went inside a Hazelwood home that’s a haven for moms coming out of addiction (”A Way Out,” Sept. 27). Recovery housing is a big need in Oregon, which is why Multnomah County commissioners cited our story while earmarking $6.5 million for it late last week. But for many readers, the most arresting part of the story was that the recovery housing got financing from the beleaguered drug decriminalization initiative. Here’s what our readers had to say.
Willamette Week - Oct. 9, 2023
Alaska Natives use tradition to battle influx of drugs, addiction
With an influx of drugs surging north from Mexico, overdose death rates were the highest in 2019 and 2020 among Alaska Natives and American Indians compared to other racial and ethnic groups, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "Not only was our culture suppressed, but now we have this sickness that is destroying people and their lives," she said, referring to addiction.
USA Today - Oct. 8, 2023
National State/Local Studies/Research Opinion Reviews Comments
Studies/Research in the News
Cannabis intoxication triggers cognitive mechanism of addiction, finds study
New research from the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (IoPPN) at King's College London and the University of Oxford has found that the main component of cannabis, delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), leads to people's attention being more drawn to other cannabis stimuli when using the drug, which researchers suggest could underpin the cognitive mechanisms behind cannabis use disorder (CUD).
Medical Press - Oct. 12, 2023
Cellular atlas of amygdala reveals new treatment target for cocaine addiction
Researchers at University of California San Diego School of Medicine and the Salk Institute for Biological Studies have created a unique, cell-by-cell atlas of the amygdala, a small structure deep within the brain that plays a crucial role in controlling emotional responses to drugs. The findings, published October 5, 2023 in Nature Neuroscience, helped the researchers identify a potential new treatment for cocaine addiction, a disease that is poorly understood at the molecular level and has virtually no approved pharmacological treatments.
UC San Diego - Oct. 12, 2023
Should red wine be cut from the Mediterranean diet?
Should we remove wine from the Mediterranean diet? Yes, definitely for those under 35 years. But for older adults, it’s more complicated.
Harvard - Oct. 12, 2023
Women dying from alcohol-related disease is on the rise, CDC says
The latest government data shows that the rate of alcohol-related deaths among women is rising at a faster rate than in men. Researchers say women can't metabolize alcohol as fast as men, so they are left with higher levels of toxins in their systems. For the first time, the data revealed women in their 30s and 40s drank more than their male counterparts.
ABC7 - Oct. 10, 2023
National State/Local Studies/Research Opinion Reviews Comments
Opinion
Comments on amendments to the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act
The Internal Revenue Service, the Department of Labor, and the Department of Health and Human Services recently proposed amendments to regulations implementing the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act.
Brookings - Oct. 13, 2023
Don’t aid and abet addiction in Colorado
Call them needle exchanges; call them safe-use sites; sugar-coat them as “overdose prevention centers.” By any name, they offer most illegal drug users a one-way trip to the dead end of addiction. An interim legislative committee studying opioid abuse released the first draft of a bill last week to permit the so-called safe-use sites. The sites just prolong the agony of addicts by stringing them out longer with sterile needles and expert guidance to make sure they don’t overdose.
Denver Gazette - Oct. 10, 2023
The surprising ways cannabis can be part of drug addiction treatment
The idea that overcoming addiction means abstaining from all psychoactive substances for good is outdated and misguided - particularly as we learn more about the potential therapeutic uses of cannabis, says Maia Szalavitz. In 2017, clinical social worker Joe Schrank founded an addiction rehab centre with a novel selling point: it encouraged the use of marijuana as a way to quit other drugs and allowed smoking weed and taking edibles during residential treatment. He called it High Sobriety.
New Scientist - Oct. 5, 2023
National State/Local Studies/Research Opinion Reviews Comments