Addiction, Treatment and Recovery

Quick. What now is America’s #1 health priority, according to the polls?

Cancer? Guess again.
Heart disease? Guess again.
Alcohol/drug addiction? Hah.
Obesity is now America’s #1 health concern.

Given that 31 percent of U.S. adults are obese (30 or more pounds over a healthy weight) – the numbers are up from 23 percent in the late 1980s and 15 percent in the late 1970s – and that considerable media attention has been directed at this phenomenon, it’s perhaps understandable that obesity claims the #1 health-concern spot.

You also have to consider that the percentage of obese people being treated for high cholesterol, mental disorders and upper gastrointestinal disorders increased 10 percentage points between 1987 and 2002. And that the increase in adult-onset diabetes contributed to a 64 percent rise in diabetes treatment during the same period.

Obesity is very much in the public mind.

Still, why is it that alcohol/drug addiction simply isn’t in the public mind? My own completely unscientific answer to that question is that most Americans believe implicitly or explicitly that if we just ignore the disease of addiction and its terrible cost in terms of family destruction and economic ruin, it will somehow vanish.

Forgive the pun, but – fat chance!

Peter D. Hart Research Associates recently interviewed 1,000 adults, 300 physicians and 500 persons in recovery. The survey was commissioned by the Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America.

Forty-one percent of the adults surveyed said they’d encouraged a loved one to seek help for an alcohol or drug problem. Seventy-four percent said that addiction to alcohol or other drugs has had at least some impact on their life.

Yet the disease is regarded as the lowest health priority. The number of Americans entering alcoholism treatment programs has been declining steadily, dropping by more than 23 percent between 1993 and 2003, the latest year for which federal statistics are available.

In the Hart poll, a majority of the members of the public saw addiction to alcohol or other drugs as primarily a personal or moral weakness. Only 34 percent of the public believes that addiction is a disease.

So the stigma continues as strong as ever.

Forgive us if and when those of us in the treatment field feel sometimes like we’re banging our collective heads against the wall.

The 2004 National Survey on Drug Use and Health found that of Americans 12 and older, nearly 8.5 million were addicted to alcohol and nearly 5 million were addicted to other drugs. About 1.5 million were addicted to both, according to the survey by the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.

That’s 15 million sister and brother Americans.

They shouldn’t and can’t be out-of-sight, out-of-mind.

I’m reminded of the big banner that used to adorn the wall of my high school gymnasium: “Just Keep Putting One Foot In Front of the Other.”

That, I suppose, is what we must keep doing, when it comes to trying to educate the public about the disease of alcoholism/drug addiction, the potential offered by treatment, and the life-saving/life-enhancing promise of recovery.

Related posts:

1. The Political Season is Upon Us
2. Treatment: Why Bother?
3. U.S. Representative Jim Ramstad Announces New Congressional Recovery Caucus in Betty Ford Center Address
4. Underage Drinkers Hypocrisy

One Response to “Obesity Outweighs Addiction Concern”

1. Aneisha says:

   April 16, 2011 at 1:51 pm

   Good point. I hadn’t thought about it quite that way.