Landmark Report by Surgeon General Calls Drug Crisis ‘A Moral Test for America’
A landmark report released Thursday by U.S. Surgeon General Vivek H. Murthy places drug and alcohol addiction alongside smoking, AIDS and other public health crises of the past half-century, calling the current epidemic “a moral test for America.”
“The reason I’m issuing this report is I want to call our country to action around what has become a pressing public health issue,” Murthy said in an interview. “I want our country to understand the magnitude of this crisis. I’m not sure everyone does.”
The report, “Facing Addiction,” pulls together the latest information on the health impacts of drug and alcohol misuse, as well as on the issues surrounding treatment and prevention. It offers reasons for optimism despite a still-increasing overdose epidemic that has killed more than 500,000 Americans since 2000, and it presents evidence that addiction is a treatable brain disease, with new therapies under development.
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