The expression “crazy addicts” is very politically incorrect. But the politically-correct jargon wouldn’t fit on the Subject line. It is “people with co-existing mental health and substance abuse disorders.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/24/opinion/addiction-overdos…
**12 Americans Die of an Overdose Every Hour. We Have the Knowledge to Prevent That.**
**By Jeneen Interlandi, The New York Times, June 24, 2022**
**...**
**More people are dying of drug overdoses in the United States today than at any point in modern history. The overdose fatality rate surpassed 100,000 per year for the first time ever in 2021. Halfway through 2022, it appears to be rising even further (the latest numbers come out to about 300 people per day, or 12 people every hour, on average).**
[That’s about the same number as are currently dying from Covid-19. --W] **...**
**Substance use is especially dangerous for people with mental health conditions. They are much more likely to become addicted, and face a higher risk of overdose and other bad outcomes when they do. It’s common for these disorders to occur together. Roughly half of those who have one also have the other. And it’s crucial for them to be managed together, especially in teenagers whose brains are still developing, because they tend to amplify one another. ...**
**Twenty-two percent of 13- to 18-year-olds have a mental health disorder with severe impact...the vast majority are not receiving any kind of treatment for it....**
[end quote]
This is a long article which highlights a macro-scale problem. Mental illnesses are common in the United States. Children as well as adults suffer from mental illness. Some mental illnesses commonly appear during adolescence (e.g. schizophrenia).
https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/mental-illness
https://www.cdc.gov/childrensmentalhealth/data.html
Many people with mental illness self-medicate with drugs and alcohol. My mentee told me that about one in five of the students in her high school class came to school high.
Addiction and mental health services are still effectively separate in many states. Both are separate, in treament location and health insurance, from medical care even though there are many cross-impacts.
Psychiatrists who treat mental illness often won’t treat addicts – they require the addict to stop using (which is difficult to impossible). Addiction rehabs often won’t allow recovering addicts to use any drugs, even prescribed psychiatric medications. A young man in our area committed suicide when stuck in this Catch-22.
A new approach (called “Encompass” as described in the article) treats both mental illness and addiction as life-long, relapsing chronic brain co-morbidity. It involves weekly talk therapy supplemented by psychiatric and anti-addiction medications when appropriate. That sounds simple and reasonable but runs into the practical barrier of the existing system. It’s a good idea that doesn’t exist at this time.
Crazy addicts – people with co-morbidity of mental illness and addiction – are difficult to live with and difficult to work with. Many are homeless. A high and growing number are dying. The high numbers and lack of effective treatment make this a Macro tragedy.
Wendy