When it comes to fighting heroin, Lynch said everyone has a role to play.
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“Every day that passes without congressional action to provide these additional resources is a missed opportunity to save lives”, the White House said.
In her opening comments, Lynch asked the almost 500 students if they had been considering where they would go to college, what careers they had planned for their futures, whether as journalists, doctors, law enforcement, teachers or fashion bloggers.
Lynch is hosting a youth town hall meeting in the morning at Madison Central High School in Richmond, cautioning teens about the dangers of experimenting with drugs.
“And we all need them to know that if they are struggling with opioid abuse, they are not alone”, Lynch said in prepared remarks.
Kerry B. Harvey and his staff that sends parents who have lost children to overdoses to schools, churches, community groups and even prison to put a face to the epidemic.
“If people could just quit because they wanted to, because it was easy, we wouldn’t have this problem”, Lynch said.
The Obama Administration declared this week Prescription Opioid and Heroin Epidemic Awareness Week.
Alex Elswick, a former Centre College student, says many heroin abusers start out like him, with a legal prescription for painkillers that fuels addiction and leads to heroin abuse. About 165,000 people in the US have died of prescription painkiller overdoses since 2000. “This is an issue that cuts across party lines, community lines, socioeconomic lines and we certainly call upon Congress to take up this issue”.
Of special interest to Cincinnati residents is a recent decision by Hamilton County officials to offer immunity to anyone who hands heroin over to police.
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Lynch also said law enforcement is focused on cracking down on drug dealers. After he was prescribed pain pills following oral surgery, he slowly got hooked on the pills and then turned to heroin. Lynch pointed to data collection as a crucial tool for monitoring prescriptions and sharing information between states.
