{"id":15328,"date":"2019-04-18T18:31:32","date_gmt":"2019-04-18T18:31:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/?p=15328"},"modified":"2020-01-14T19:52:49","modified_gmt":"2020-01-14T19:52:49","slug":"drug-court-giving-families-a-chance-to-break-the-cycle-of-opioid-use","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/2019\/04\/drug-court-giving-families-a-chance-to-break-the-cycle-of-opioid-use\/","title":{"rendered":"Drug Court \u2013 Giving Families A Chance To Break The Cycle Of Opioid Use"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The Washington County drug court graduation ceremony for Maria Kestner. Photograph: Fred R Conrad<\/span><\/p>\n

Photographer\u00a0Fred R Conrad<\/a>\u00a0visited a Virginia drug court last year and saw how individuals and families had been given a second chance \u2013 so when he went back this summer he had a question: did they take it?<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\u201cOpioid and methamphetamine abuse tore through this area like a wildfire.\u201d<\/span><\/div>\n
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This is the view of Rebecca Holmes, who is responsible for mental health and drug use outpatient treatment in Abingdon, Washington County,\u00a0Virginia<\/a>, as she looks back at the decision to set up a drug court.<\/span><\/p>\n

Holmes, the medical director of Highlands Community Services, had seen how the growing crisis around opioids had taken such a heavy toll on families in the town, which is home to just over 8,000 people.<\/span><\/p>\n

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There was a growing need for a small group of addicts that did not respond to treatment or programs offered by the existing court or probation, she said, so five years ago she applied for a grant to use a federal model for a drug court that had first emerged in 1989.<\/span><\/p>\n

The county\u2019s drug court has been in place for several years now and Holmes feels that it has never been more needed. Last year in Virginia there were more deaths from heroin and opioids than highway fatalities for the first time, and the governor declared a public health emergency.<\/span><\/p>\n

Nationally, opioids are said to be killing 90 people a day.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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