The Washington Post (6/20, Achenbach, Keating) reports that the opioid epidemic is “swamping hospitals,” with a report by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality “showing 1.27 million emergency room visits or inpatient stays for opioid-related issues in a single year.” According to the report, Maryland tops the list for inpatient care due to opioids.

Related Links:

— “In just one year, nearly 1.3 million Americans needed hospital care for opioid-related issues,” Joel Achenbach and Dan Keating, Washington Post, June 20, 2017.

In an opinion piece in the New York Times (6/21, A21, Subscription Publication), Phillip Atiba Goff, president of the Center for Policing Equity, and Kim Shayo Buchanan, senior academic writer at that same center, write in wake of the recent Seattle police shooting of Charleena Lyles, a pregnant woman with mental illness, “People with untreated mental illnesses are disproportionately likely to attract police attention.” In particular, “the combination of mental illness, racial segregation and poverty is…likely to result in police contact, often leading to arrest.”

Over the past five decades, however, the US “has seen a stunning decline in resources devoted to public mental health.” Goff and Buchanan conclude, “The cure for these too frequent police-involved shootings must include serious changes within law enforcement” coupled with a recommitment “to changing how we manage mental health if we are to reduce the chances that illness will be treated with gunshots.”

Related Links:

— “Charleena Lyles Needed Health Care. Instead, She Was Killed.,” PHILLIP ATIBA GOFF and KIM SHAYO BUCHANAN, New York Times, June 20, 2017.

HealthDay (6/21, Preidt) reports, “Opioid-related hospitalizations among women in the United States increased far faster than among men between 2005 and 2014,” according to the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ). Data indicate “hospitalizations involving opioid painkillers or heroin rose 75 percent” among women versus 55 percent among men.

Related Links:

— “Opioid-Linked Hospitalizations Rising Fastest for Women: Study,” Robert Preidt, HealthDay, June 21, 2017.

MedPage Today (6/21, Boyles) reports, “Treating depression and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in patients with both conditions reduced hospital emergency department (ED)” use “and hospitalizations,” researchers found in an analysis of Medicare data including some 16,075 beneficiaries. The findings were published in the August issue of Respiratory Medicine.

Related Links:

— “Study Looks at ‘Interplay’ of COPD and Depression Meds,” Salynn Boyles, MedPage Today, June 21, 2017.

HealthDay (6/21, Preidt) reports that about 20 years “after the US farm crisis, the suicide rate among American farmers remains much higher than among other workers,” researchers found. The study revealed that between 1992 and 2010, “230 US farmers died by suicide.” Farmers “in the West had the highest rate, accounting for 43 percent of all farmer suicides, followed by those in the Midwest (37 percent), the South (13 percent), and the Northeast (6 percent).” The findings were published online May 2 in the Journal of Rural Health.

Related Links:

— “Suicide Risk Especially High for U.S. Farmers,” Robert Preidt, HealthDay, June 21, 2017.

The New York Times (6/19, Bakalar, Subscription Publication) reports that “25 children die from bullet wounds” in an average week in the United States, according to “researchers writing in the journal Pediatrics” who “analyzed data gathered by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and by the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System.” The Times says researchers found that African-American children had “nearly 10 times” the annual rate of firearm homicides found among whites, and white children had “almost four times” the suicide rate found among blacks. The article quotes lead author and CDC behavioral scientist Katherine A. Fowler as saying, “There isn’t a single issue in isolation that increases the likelihood of gun death.”

USA Today (6/19, Rossman) reports that, in an average day, the study revealed that “19 children in the United States are either killed or injured by a firearm.” In addition, the CDC found “a 60% increase in kids aged 10 to 17 committing suicide with a firearm” from 2007 to 2014. The article says Fowler recommends street outreach programs and school programs to reduce street gun violence and help children manage emotions that lead to gun violence.

Related Links:

— “A Dire Weekly Total for the U.S.: 25 Children Killed by Guns,”Nicholas Bakalar, The New York Times, June 19, 2017.

The Los Angeles Times (6/19, Simmons) reports that young women in the US “are poorer than their mothers and grandmothers were when they were young, more likely to commit suicide and be shut out of high-paying tech jobs – an overall demise in well-being since the Baby Boom generation, according to” the findings of a report from the Population Reference Bureau. The report, called “Losing Ground: Young Women’s Well Being Across Generations in the United States,” revealed that “social and structural barriers continue to obstruct the advancement of female members of Generation X and millennials.”

Related Links:

— “Young American women are poorer than their moms and grandmas, and more likely to commit suicide,”Ann M. Simmons, Los Angeles Times , June 19, 2017.

MD Magazine (6/19, Bender) reports researchers “found that 46 percent of patients receiving antidepressant medication for major depression experience emotional blunting.” Investigators arrived at this conclusion after conducting an Internet-based survey among “66,000 individuals in the US, 40,000 in the UK and 98,000 in Canada.” The findings, which appear online, will be published in October 15 issue of the Journal of Affective Disorders.

Related Links:

— “Half of Patients on Antidepressants Experience Emotional Blunting,”Kenneth Bender, MD Magazine, June 19, 2017.

Vox (6/19, Belluz) reports there appears to be “relatively strong evidence linking a mother’s infection with the rubella virus during pregnancy to an increased risk of autism in her baby,” but the “evidence for other viruses – such as influenza, or herpes – is much less clear.” Alice Kau, PhD, program director for research on autism at the National Institutes of Health, said, “Some studies show some associations [between infections and autism] and others don’t. … The findings are mixed.”

Related Links:

— “Researchers have ditched the autism-vaccine hypothesis. Here’s what they think actually causes it,”Julia Belluz, Vox , June 19, 2017.

The AP (6/19, Johnson) reports that “only 1 in 4 teens and young adults with opioid addiction receive recommended treatment medication despite having good health insurance,” according to a study published in JAMA Pediatrics. The study “suggests doctors are not keeping up with the needs of youth caught up in the worst addiction crisis in U.S. history.”

Reuters (6/19, Rapaport) reports that the study also found “younger teens, females, and black and Hispanic youth were less likely to get medication for opioid use disorder than older youth, males and white people.”

HealthDay (6/19, Reinberg) and MedPage Today (6/19, Walker) also cover the story.

Related Links:

— “FEW OPIOID-ADDICTED YOUTH GET STANDARD TREATMENT MEDICATION,”Carla K. Johnson, AP, June 19, 2017.