prompted 04.07.16 Prescription opioid use is at an all-time high in the United States. In fact, although we make up just five percent of the world s population, we use 99 percent of the world s hydrocodone (also known as Vicodin) and 80 percent of its oxycodone (also known as Percocet or Oxycontin). Unfortunately, these medications come with a high potential for addiction and abuse. What starts out as a legitimately prescribed medical treatment following an injury or surgery can quickly spiral out of control, claiming lives and damaging families in the process. Teens are particularly at risk. Peer pressure, ease of access and a general lack of knowledge about the risks of prescription drug abuse can make for a deadly combination. In fact, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have reported that someone dies of an unintentional drug overdose every 19 minutes. As part of our ongoing commitment to educating the public about this epidemic, CVS Health has created the Pharmacists Teach program, which provides teens with the facts about prescription drug abuse through the One Choice Changes Everything presentation. Our pharmacists volunteer to visit high school health classes, youth organizations, or faith-based groups and give a powerful presentation that includes stories of real youths whose lives were forever changed by their choice to misuse or abuse prescription painkillers. "Every year, more than 44,000 people in the United States die from accidental drug overdoses, says Tom Davis, RPh, Vice President, Pharmacy Professional Practices. This program provides targeted education to society s most vulnerable population for drug experimentation: pre-teens and teens. Dispelling the widely held belief among kids in this age group that prescription drugs are safer to experiment with and abuse than street drugs is perhaps one of the most valuable lessons they can receive. To date, over 300,000 students in hundreds of communities across the United States have taken part in the program, and feedback from school administrators has been overwhelmingly positive. One high school principal in New York described the program as an effective and powerful message toward preventing further tragedies in the community. However, educating young people is only one facet of addiction prevention. Research shows that children who learn about the risks of drugs from their parents are up to 50 percent less likely to use drugs than those who don t get this information at home. In response, we ve recently expanded our outreach to create a prevention education program for the adults in these teens lives, called Prescription for Parents . The Pharmacists Teach program is offered free of charge to students in grades 7-12 and groups of parents/adults in the communities where our pharmacists live and work. For information about bringing the program to your area, please send an email to PharmacistsTeach@cvshealth.com . This article was originally published on April 7, 2016, and was updated to reflect current data on October 23, 2017. Naloxone availability across the United States 4 6 See States Alabama Alaska Arizona Arkansas California Colorado Connecticut Delaware Florida Georgia Idaho Illinois Indiana Iowa Kansas Kentucky Louisiana Maryland Massachusetts Michigan Minnesota Mississippi Missouri Montana Nevada New Hampshire New Jersey New Mexico New York North Carolina North Dakota Ohio Oklahoma Oregon Pennsylvania Rhode Island South Carolina South Dakota Tennessee Texas Utah Vermont Virginia Washington West Virginia Wisconsin CVS Pharmacy patients in 46 states now have access to the opioid overdose-reversal drug, naloxone. Follow our commitment to drug abuse prevention as we increase access to the life-saving opioid overdose reversal drug. Related Articles CVS Health and POLITICO Examine the Opioid Crisis A quick and easy-to-understand explanation of one of the most pressing challenges in public health: the opioid epidemic. Tackling the Nation s Opioid Crisis: POLITICO Pro Health Care Briefing Experts weigh in with personal experiences and multifaceted solutions to addressing the opioid crisis in America. A State of Emergency: Integrative Approaches to Addiction and the Opioid Epidemic Moriarty discusses the power of partnerships in tackling the opioid epidemic. Related Press Releases 10.26.17 CVS Health Recognizes President s Declaration of Public Health Emergency to Help End Opioid Epidemic 09.21.17 CVS Health Fighting National Opioid Abuse Epidemic With Enterprise Initiatives 09.12.17 CVS Health Makes Overdose-Reversal Drug Available Without Individual Prescription at CVS Pharmacy Locations in Kansas 07.27.17 CVS Health Makes Overdose-Reversal Drug Available Without Individual Prescription at CVS Pharmacy Locations in South Dakota 06.07.17 CVS Pharmacy Now Using Time Delay Safes in Ohio for Controlled Substances to Combat Opioid Epidemic, Reduce Robbery Incidents 05.23.17 Attorney General Brnovich, Rep. Carter Join CVS Health to Announce Availability of Naloxone at All CVS Pharmacy Locations in Arizona business enterprise
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