PLEASE WEIGHT – Aug. 22, 2024 – The medication, semaglutide, is sold by the the Danish pharma giant in the United States as Ozempic for diabetes and Wegovy for weight loss. The study raises additional concerns over a possible link between highly-coveted diabetes and weight loss drugs like Ozempic and suicidal ideation. In the new observational study, researchers analyzed adverse drug reactions tracked by a World Health Organization (WHO) database. The analysis found 107 reports of patients taking semaglutide who said they had suicidal thoughts. When compared with all the other drugs in the database, people taking semaglutide had a…
Author: Leonard Buschel
VIDEO – ADDICTS LIVES MATTER – Aug. 2024 – The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner reported a 15% overall drop in overdose deaths so far this year. The city is largely crediting the work of its night navigation team for its work taking treatment to the streets. “I want to celebrate that yes the numbers are low but at the end of the day we still have so much more to do,” said Donna Hilliard. Aug. 2024 – The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner reported a 15% overall drop in overdose deaths so far this year. The city…
BIG PHARMA HAPPY – Aug. 17, 2024 – In huge numbers, older people are taking gabapentin (Neurontin) for a variety of conditions, including itching, alcohol dependence and sciatica. “It’s crazy,” one expert said. Early on, Warner-Lambert, the manufacturer of gabapentin, pushed off-label prescriptions of the drug through aggressive marketing methods that the Justice Department deemed illegal and fraudulent; the company settled the government’s suit for $430 million in 2004. Still, gabapentin use tripled between 2002 and 2015. It received another boost as opioid use and misuse grew to crisis proportions. “People were searching for alternatives, and this was often the…
SOBER VIBES TOO – Aug. 20, 2024 – ”It’s good to have that taste – you still get the taste of a brew. I’m trying to stay healthier, been focusing on my wellness and health aspect of things and just trying to have a good vibe before the season starts but also get that good flavor.” Fall and football go hand in hand, and Athletic is proud to be the go-to non-alcoholic beer for tailgaters nationwide,” the company’s co-founder and CEO, Bill Shufelt, said in a statement. “We’re thrilled to be teaming up with an elite athlete like Quinn. He’s…
NOW WHAT? – Aug. 15, 2024. – THIS IMAGE COULD be hung in a gallery, but it started life as a tiny chunk of a woman’s brain. In 2014, a woman undergoing surgery for epilepsy had a tiny chunk of her cerebral cortex removed. This cubic millimeter of tissue has allowed Harvard and Google researchers to produce the most detailed wiring diagram of the human brain that the world has ever seen. Biologists and machine-learning experts spent 10 years building an interactive map of the brain tissue, which contains approximately 57,000 cells and 150 million synapses. It shows cells…
UNDERSTANDING AND COMPASSION – Aug. 16, 2024 – Daniel Grant, 46, overdosed on fentanyl in 2020. He passed out just before heading into work. His boss found him with the straw he used to snort what he thought was pure oxycodone still in his hand 45 minutes after snorting the pill. Paramedics gave him an IV of naloxone — an overdose reversal agent — twice, but it didn’t keep his heart from stopping three times. They gave him another dose. “I could just hear, I couldn’t move, I couldn’t see, I don’t remember smelling anything, I tried to speak…
CRAZY – Aug. 16, 2024 – “I’m very honest when I say no amount of alcohol is good for the brain. When you sit in [the moderate drinking] category, [the scientific literature] shows that you can literally have low-level brain damage. You are killing the neurons in your brain,” Nicola explains. “So, drinking is not good for you,” she expounds. Unsurprisingly, the impact of alcohol on overall brain function can play into dementia risk as well. In fact, the Lancet updated its dementia prevention review in 2020 to add three new modifiable risk factors of dementia: air pollution, traumatic brain…
SHE’S STILL FAMOUS – Aug. 16, 2024 – The former Bad Girls actress admitted she lost everything at one point, but was able to figure out why she was doing what she was doing during her time in rehab. Speaking on the Soap from the Box podcast back in 2021, Alicya – who played Ruby Haswell in the show – said: ‘I ended up losing everything, including myself. That was the main thing. So, I went to rehab.” In the podcast episode, she added: ‘The first lockdown we had, all fine, all good. Then this lockdown has been really…
HOPE AND HEART – Aug. 20, 2024 – “I know that because having lived experience myself, I can help ease a service user’s mind, make the process feel less clinical and help them to understand some of their needs and vulnerabilities. “Being visible and open to discussion, helps build professional rapport and reduce stigma. “The reason I came in to this was to help to make changes,” said Mr Major, who facilitates support groups and helps people start treatment. Sunjay Patel, who has been alcohol free for the last six years, said his addiction started when he began abusing Tippex…
VIDEO – SAVE THE CHILDREN – Aug. 21, 2024 – “It’s just hard, like, before you’re pregnant, to get back to that happiness and that energy level and stuff, because you’re…caring for a newborn or toddler,” Nicole Lindsey said. She’s staying at Lily’s House with her 1-year-old son, River, to ensure she doesn’t relapse, as she’s expecting another child in a couple of months. CONTINUE@WPSD
EVERYTHING IS BETTER ON STAGE – Aug. 22, 2024 – There are few certainties in David Ireland’s latest drama. It is slippery yet sincere, funny but serious, with an ending that might leave you none the wiser. A young out-of-work alcoholic is unsure about joining the 12-step programme until a former addict sweeps in as his sponsor to save him, or so it seems. Under the direction of Finn den Hertog, The Fifth Step sometimes feels oddly paced, with movement crudely contrived and a visual hallucination of a giant rabbit that seems borrowed from Donnie Darko and which is…
FILM REVIEW – Aug. 2024 – Because she has drugs in her purse, she is immediately shipped off to a fantastical co-ed drug rehab center wherein everyone wears pink jumpsuits and sleeps in prison-like cells. Because the editing in “The Crow” is so bad … The premise should be easy to describe, but Sanders and his screenwriters, Zach Baylin and William Schneider, heaped in a little too much nonsensical lore. The young drug addict Shelly (FKA Twigs) and her best friend Zadie (Isabella Wei) have an incriminating video of billionaire industrialist Vincent Roeg (Danny Huston). Roeg, it seems, is…
VIDEO – MUSICAL INTERLUDE – 2014 – 3,479,867,202 views – “Blank Space” is a song by the American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift and the second single from her fifth studio album, 1989 (2014). CONTINUE@YouTube
HE WILL NOT BE SOON FORGOTTEN – Aug. 23, 2024 – In the aftermath of Perry’s death, many press reports focused on ketamine’s growing use for treatment-resistant depression. When it is administered under medical supervision, it is generally safe—and for some patients who haven’t responded to conventional anti-depressant treatments—highly effective. However, ketamine should never be used for self-treatment. Perry readily evaded this caveat by turning to sources willing to supply him with ever-increasing doses. For this reason, I worry that the rapid proliferation of “ketamine clinics” and telehealth prescribing may prompt regulators to sharply restrict access to this helpful…
PRISON HAS TO HURT – Aug. 22, 2024 – Diana Moore, 44, of Mesa was ordered this week by a judge to pay over $21 million in restitution to the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System for fraudulently billing the public service, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office of Arizona. Starting in 2020, the defendant began obtaining the identification numbers of AHCCCS members by paying other providers to transport members to her counseling facilities. After the members left, Moore would continuously bill AHCCCS by falsely claiming her entities were providing these members daily care for up to 90 days. Moore…
CARNIVORES DILEMMA? – Aug. 21, 2024 – For sausage, salami and steak lovers, the news has not been good. Scientists have been consistently finding links between red and processed meat consumption and heart disease, some types of cancer and earlier death. Now, recent studies have added to the growing body of evidence that a meat-heavy diet may increase the risk of Type 2 diabetes. In one of the studies, published Tuesday in The Lancet Diabetes and Endocrinology, researchers analyzed data from nearly 2 million adults participating in 31 studies across 20 countries, including the United States and parts of…
VIDEO – SUPPLY & DEMAND? – Aug. 15, 2024 – The four-year-long investigation began after the Sheriff’s Office learned Tri-County Medical Center LLC, was operating as an illegal pain-management clinic. Through the business, Sheriff Mike Prendergast alleged, just over 39,900 controlled substances prescriptions were written.” The amount of oxycodone and methadone alone that we seized could kill more than 1.2 million people here in the state of Florida. The sheriff said one search warrant at Scriven’s home led to the discovery of additional drugs, firearms and documents that linked his criminal activity at the medical facility. Another search of storage…
WHAT PLANET IS THIS? – Aug. 16, 2024 – A 47-year-old grandmother is reportedly facing multiple felony charges following the death of her 2-year-old grandson, Amani Day, who was found unresponsive in bed next to her on October 20, 2023. Tasha Mulcahy, the grandmother, had Amani and his older sister in primary care since January 2023, when their mother died of an overdose. According to local news channel Fox 59, Mulcahy reported that Amani had been behaving normally the night before, playing with other children. She stated that she was the only one in bed with Amani when she woke…
FIRST HAND ACCOUNT – Aug. 19, 2024 – The thought of relaxing at the firepit in an Adirondack chair with an ice-cold glass of rosé made me salivate, the way my dog does when I pull the lid off the treat jar. Any other time, I would’ve had a glass (or two), but I was trying out sobriety. For years, I toyed with the idea but couldn’t ever seem to do it until my drinking started to keep me up at night. I tried natural sleep supplements and acupuncture but neither worked. At 44, I didn’t drink enough to experience…
OUT OF THE MOUTHS OF BABES – Aug. 20, 2024 – “It started with my daughter saying, ‘Dad, you know I can tell when you’re high?’” MGK recalled, revealing that Casie was just 11 or 12 years old at the time. He further reflected, “It broke my heart. It was the ultimate let down.” It wasn’t until a few years later that MGK finally got sober. The Killshot rapper shared, “It took me a while afterward, because obviously drugs have a vice grip on you. That was step one for me. As a father and as a man, to…
VIDEO – FAMILIAR ROLE – Aug. 23, 2024 – Lathan, who previously revealed to PEOPLE she had quit drinking in 2018, says there were multiple reasons for both her alcohol intake and decision to stop. “Navigating life as a woman, as a Black woman in Hollywood, is not for the faint of heart,” she says. “And people cope in different ways. ince going alcohol-free, Lathan’s career has included producing and starring in Nappily Ever After, earning her first-ever Emmy nomination for a guest role on Succession and directing and leading 2022 hit On the Come Up. She says that her…
AUDIO – TOO HIGH – Aug. 23, 2024 – Charlie Sheen’s ex-wife, Brooke Mueller, has become embroiled in the investigation into Matthew Perry’s death from a drug overdose. Police have reportedly questioned the former model, who has a long history of drug addiction, as part of the investigation into the Friends star’s death from a ketamine overdose last year. They also searched the sober living facility she’s in, and took an iPhone and laptop belonging to her. Brooke and Matthew reportedly struck up an “unlikely friendship” after meeting in rehab a few years ago. Over the years their relationship…
SO MANY LOST – Aug. 2024 – This is the world’s largest annual campaign to end overdose, remember without stigma those who have died and acknowledge the grief of family and friends left behind. Our theme for 2024 is “Together we can”, highlighting the power of our community when we all stand together. According to provisional data from the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics, there were an estimated 107,543 drug overdose deaths in the United States during 2023. This is a slight decrease from the 111,029 estimated deaths in 2022, marking the first decline in U.S. overdose deaths since…
IT’S COMPLICATED – Aug. 20, 2024 – Fans of “Friends” star Matthew Perry may find new revelations about his final days both heartbreaking and puzzling. An addiction specialist at MUSC Health offers some insight about how and why somebody who seemed to be on the road to recovery died of an overdose – and what that specialist wants people to understand about drug and alcohol use disorders. Court documents contain a sadly memorable line from Perry. “Shoot me up with a big one,” the actor allegedly told his personal assistant the day he died. The documents show that Perry…
VIDEO – TOO SAD! – Aug. 23, 2024 – A Houston man who was accused of dealing the drugs that killed a young woman is going to prison. Adam Briggs, 40, was sentenced to five years in prison on Thursday after pleading guilty to a charge of possession with intent to deliver that was connected with the death of Honor Wallace. Wallace, 25, died from a heroin and fentanyl overdose in July 2022. Briggs was charged in connection with it in February 2023. The Houston Police Department and prosecutors said they linked Briggs to Wallace’s death through text messages. He…
MODERATION IS THE KEY? – Aug. 21, 2024 – The animal tranquilizer and club-drug “Special K” has made a comeback as a trendy antidepressant for creative elites. Unlike many celebrities’ high-profile struggles with opiates, cocaine and alcohol, even the most desperate ketamine-dependency cases – and the “Friends” star’s was certainly one – have been consigned to the shadows. Overdose deaths from ketamine alone are extremely rare, experts say, and no national fatality statistics exist. And yet Perry’s fast ride to deep dependency — an indictment said he shot up six to eight times on the day of his death –…
“Say what you are. Not what you would like to be. Not what you have to be. Just say what you are. And what you are is good enough.” – John Cassavetes, 1929, New York–1989, Los Angeles
LOST IN THE WEED – Aug. 14, 2024 – Cannabis use disorder is diagnosed when a person has two or more of such symptoms as craving weed, becoming tolerant to its effects, using more than intended, using marijuana even though it causes problems in life, using it in high-risk situations, experiencing withdrawal and being unable to quit. “While our study did not differentiate between methods of cannabis consumption, cannabis is most commonly consumed by smoking,” Kokot said in an email. “The association we found likely pertains mainly to smoked cannabis.” Some 69% of people with a diagnosis of oral…
VIDEO – TEAM WORK – Aug. 16, 2024 – Mike McDaniel and Dan Quinn coached together in Atlanta, when Quinn was the Falcons head coach and McDaniel was an offensive assistant. CONTINUE@YouTube
STILL OR SPARKLING? – Aug. 8, 2024 – The researchers found no reduction in heart disease deaths among light or moderate drinkers, regardless of this health or socioeconomic status, when compared with occasional drinkers. “We did not find evidence of a beneficial association between low drinking and mortality,” said Dr. Rosario Ortolá. The findings add to a mounting body of evidence that is shifting the paradigm in alcohol research. Scientists are turning to new methodologies to analyze the risks and benefits of alcohol consumption in an attempt to correct what some believe were serious flaws in earlier research, which…