{"id":20837,"date":"2026-03-22T18:22:47","date_gmt":"2026-03-22T17:22:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/?p=20837"},"modified":"2026-03-22T18:22:47","modified_gmt":"2026-03-22T17:22:47","slug":"understanding-the-health-impacts-of-the-rapid-shift-to-drug-smoking-in-the-us","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/2026\/03\/understanding-the-health-impacts-of-the-rapid-shift-to-drug-smoking-in-the-us\/","title":{"rendered":"Understanding the Health Impacts of the Rapid Shift to Drug Smoking in the US"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"content\">\n<div class=\"widget-ArticleBreadcrumbLinks widget-instance-AMA_ArticleBreadcrumbLink\" data-widget-name=\"ArticleBreadcrumbLinks\" data-widget-instance=\"AMA_ArticleBreadcrumbLink\">\n<nav aria-label=\"Breadcrumb\"><strong><span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\">JAMA &#8211;\u00a0Internal Medicine<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/nav>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"articleTopInfo_wrap\">\n<div class=\"widget-ArticleTopInfo widget-instance-AMA_ArticleTopInfo_New\" data-widget-name=\"ArticleTopInfo\" data-widget-instance=\"AMA_ArticleTopInfo_New\">\n<div class=\"content-scroll-bar-wrap sticky\">\n<div class=\"activity-top-info-content-scroll-bar\">\n<div class=\"outline-wrap\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"content\">\n<div class=\"article-content\">\n<div class=\"meta-article-type-wrap\">\n<div class=\"meta-article-type thm-col\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; color: #0000ff;\">by <span class=\"wi-fullname brand-fg\">George\u00a0Karandinos,\u00a0MD, PhD<sup>1,2<\/sup><\/span><span class=\"al-author-delim\">;\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"wi-fullname brand-fg\">Travis P.\u00a0Baggett,\u00a0MD, MPH<sup>1,2,3<\/sup><\/span><span class=\"al-author-delim\">;\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"wi-fullname brand-fg\">Daniel\u00a0Ciccarone,\u00a0MD, MPH<sup>4 &#8211; <span class=\"epreprint\"><span class=\"month\">March\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"day\">16,\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"year\">2026<\/span><\/span><\/sup><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"meta-author\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"sidebar\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">\n<div class=\"widget-ResearchSummaryLink widget-instance-AMA_ResearchSummaryLink\" data-widget-name=\"ResearchSummaryLink\" data-widget-instance=\"AMA_ResearchSummaryLink\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; color: #0000ff;\">The US is experiencing a historically unprecedented large-scale shift from opioid injecting to smoking.\u00a0The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that more fatal drug overdoses now involve smoking than any other route of administration.\u00a0Previously thought to be rare in the US, opioid smoking appears to be growing in nearly every US state. Its geographic spread, though, has been heterogeneous, initially increasing and reaching its highest prevalence in the Western US.\u00a0Recent qualitative studies have explored the motivation for this trend. These studies report that many individuals who smoke opioids perceive that smoking instead of injecting reduces their risk of overdose, infections, and wounds, minimizes the frustration of repeated injection, and avoids injection-related stigma.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\" data-widget-name=\"ResearchSummaryLink\" data-widget-instance=\"AMA_ResearchSummaryLink\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; color: #0000ff;\">Source: https:\/\/jamanetwork.com\/journals\/jamainternalmedicine\/article-abstract\/2846283<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>JAMA &#8211;\u00a0Internal Medicine by George\u00a0Karandinos,\u00a0MD, PhD1,2;\u00a0Travis P.\u00a0Baggett,\u00a0MD, MPH1,2,3;\u00a0Daniel\u00a0Ciccarone,\u00a0MD, MPH4 &#8211; March\u00a016,\u00a02026 The US is experiencing a historically unprecedented large-scale shift from opioid injecting to smoking.\u00a0The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that more fatal drug overdoses now involve smoking than any other route of administration.\u00a0Previously thought to be rare in the US, opioid [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[129,142,135,19,134],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20837","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture","category-latest-news","category-opioids","category-usa","category-vaping"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20837","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20837"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20837\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20838,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20837\/revisions\/20838"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20837"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20837"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20837"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}