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This is the sixth article in our series exploring how 91制片厂 alumni, faculty and students are tackling the heroin and opioid epidemic that has hit New Hampshire and many other parts of the country. This story reports on a panel discussion recently hosted by 91制片厂鈥檚 Justice Studies program.听

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Here鈥檚 the big takeaway from a recent Justice Studies-sponsored panel discussion on New Hampshire鈥檚 opioid crisis that has killed nearly 300 people this year: No one gets up in the morning and decides to stick a needle in their arm.

That was the consensus of the panelists who spoke to an audience of mostly 91制片厂 students gathered at the MUB earlier this month. Donna Perkins, clinical associate professor of justice, organized the discussion, drawing on a pool of experts who work closely with the program.听

鈥淭his is a subject that affects everyone in this room,鈥� said David Kelley, deputy director of New England High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, a federal agency whose goal is to disrupt drug trafficking. 鈥淭he United States has about 5 percent of the world鈥檚 population, yet we consume 90 percent of all opiates in the world. It鈥檚 supply and demand.鈥�

Melissa Silvey, director of public health and prevention with Goodwin Community Health in Somersworth, put those numbers into perspective, saying, 鈥淲e are trying to build systems to deal with the issue, but it鈥檚 like using a spoon to bail out a boat that鈥檚 sinking.鈥�

Jake Collins called the problem 鈥渁 tsunami of opiates.鈥� The assistant superintendent of education and programs at the Strafford County Jail in Dover, Collins launched the jail鈥檚 therapeutic community drug and alcohol rehabilitation initiative that has inmates with addiction issues living together, separate from the rest of the prison population, while they participate in the substance abuse program.

鈥淧reviously we had treatment and recovery facilities. There were a thousand more beds (in New Hampshire) 20 years ago than there are today.鈥�He described the Catch-22 scenario that led to the jail starting its own treatment model: An offender with a substance abuse problem could possibly have his one-year sentence suspended if he went into treatment, but because options are so limited in New Hampshire, it rarely happened.

鈥淭hey would end up serving their year before a bed opened up,鈥� Collins said. 鈥淲e shifted from total incarceration to a 90-day 鈥榖ehind the walls鈥� substance abuse program.鈥�

Recovery programs help people maintain their sobriety, John Wozmak, New Hampshire鈥檚 senior director of substance misuse and behavioral health told the audience. 鈥淧reviously we had treatment and recovery facilities. There were a thousand more beds (in New Hampshire) 20 years ago than there are today.鈥�

To help bridge the gap, several Granite State communities are in the process of opening recovery centers like the HOPE Recovery Community Center in Manchester, which offers support to recovering addicts and their families. Silvey said two locations for similar facilities in Somersworth are currently being discussed.

鈥淓veryone thinks treatment means getting a bed, but an intensive 28-day, 90-day inpatient program isn鈥檛 enough. Opiate use rewires the brain,鈥� Silvey said. 鈥淧eople need resources when they come out of rehab."

And communities need help understanding and then supporting people with opioid addictions, she added.

鈥淚t starts with a prescription,鈥� Silvey said. 鈥淚t doesn鈥檛 start with 鈥業鈥檒l stick a needle in my arm today.鈥欌��

But, too often, that is the devastating consequence of prescription drug abuse; experts contend misuse of pain medications can serve as a springboard to heroin addiction. Wozmak noted that 19 out of 30 pain pills go unused by the person for whom they were prescribed.

鈥淚t鈥檚 difficult to prosecute doctors for overprescribing,鈥� Wozmak said, while Silvey, referencing lawsuits against the tobacco industry for not making smokers aware that cigarettes are addictive, said, 鈥淲here is the responsibility of the pharmaceutical companies that aren鈥檛 testing these drugs enough or aren鈥檛 educating doctors about how addictive they are? Where are those lawsuits?鈥�

Captain David Kretschmar, investigations division commander with the Somersworth Police Department, said the city has had 99 drug overdoses this year, 10 of which were fatal.

鈥淚f we couldn鈥檛 have brought them back with Narcan (a prescription drug used to reverse the effects of opioid overdoses), there would have been 99 dead,鈥� he said. 鈥淥ne in 100 people are overdosing 鈥� that鈥檚 one of you in this room.鈥�

Kretschmar, who has been with the Somersworth department for 32 years, noted there are cycles for illegal drugs, with cost and access impacting what is in demand at a given time. Cocaine, crack, crystal methamphetamine, Oxycontin have all had their day, he said. The difference is that people don't die as often from the other drugs, he said. 鈥淩ight now, heroin is cheap and easy to get. And it鈥檚 killing a lot of people.鈥�

But that wasn鈥檛 the case until recently. According to Kelley, New Hampshire had fewer than 10 heroin overdoses a year between 1993 and 2007. In 2014, 321 people lost their lives to opioids. The state medical examiner has said he expects that figure will be surpassed before 2015 ends 鈥� a fact that isn鈥檛 surprising when you consider this, offered by Wozmak: 鈥淭here are at least 400,000 doses of heroin coming into the state every day.鈥�

In the end, the discussion came back to the fact that addiction is a disease and the addict needs help getting that disease into remission. As Wozmak said, 鈥淣o one makes a conscious decision to destroy every single aspect of their life.鈥�

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