Transcripts For CSPAN Washington Journal 20171226

Makers in curbing heroin and opioid addiction. You can call in. Your numbers are on the screen. 2027370002 for mountain and pacific zones and special line for those impacted by opioids also 2026280205 is that number. You can catch up was on twitter and facebook its facebook. Com cspan. Host very good Tuesday Morning and well spend the first hour of our program talking about this topic and as you are calling in i want to show you a clip from the senate floor last thursday, indiana senator Joe Donnelley called more resources in combating the opioid christ is in awake of new centers for disease report found some 63,000 americans had died of a Drug Overdose in 2016. This is the time of year Many Americans reflect on the year that has passed and identify the priority in the years to come. In congress we need to do the same. More than 63,000 americans died last year. From opioid abuse. 63,000 moms and dads, brothers and sisters, husbands and wives, sons and daughters who are not here with us this year. We must make this issue a priority. I Hope Congress will demonstrate that fighting Opioid Epidemic is a priority. One way to do that is include meaningful resources to fund key programs. When we deal with this again before january 19th of next year. I am imploring my colleagues to make this a priority and to provide robust and meaningful funding our communities need to meaningfully and seriously address this problem. Were in the midst of a crisis. We must do more in 2018. We have families all across our nation with broken heart tonight for the ones they love and the ones they miss. Lets make sure theres no more in 2018 that this ends today. Host that was senator Joe Donnelley on the floor of the senate last week. We want to hear whether you think there was progress in fighting the Opioid Crisis. The numbers from center of Disease Control are from 2016. Some 63,000 americans died of a Drug Overdose. This chart from the Washington Post looks specifically at opioid deaths in 2016. It was 42000. More than 42000 americans specifically of some sort of opioid overdose a 28 percent increase over 2015. Another chart from the Washington Post from the same log looks at the various kinds of opioids and the surge in the deaths in and from the various kinds and the number of people fatally overdosing on agagfenta here. Well show you more charts but try to put a face on this ongoing crisis and one of the faces was profiled by the state journal register out of springfield illinois the story from the state journal talking about cory small a springfield resident that nearly died 13 times during his seven years of using heroin and lost his best friend in 2017 and his long time girlfriend earlier this year and said hell probably see opioids kill more acquaintances but he believes he will live. He wants to find love again and have children some day. The 37yearold springfield resident has hope even if mixed worry that he wont return to heroin and survive the nationwide Opioid Crisis. Some experts say hasnt been since the aids crisis he became addicted to heroin after getting hooks on painkillers and hes been saved from overdose by n c norc norcan. The local and state level are addressing this through life saving efforts and prevention rather than a war on drug style focus but Officials Say many challenges lie ahead including a lack of funding. That in the springfield if you want to read more about he and his story. We want to hear your stories this morning. Have lines split up by time zone if youre in Eastern Central time zones. If youre in mountain pacific its 2027370002 and special line for those impacts by Opioid Crisis is 2026280205. Jacob calling in from West Virginia. Good morning. Caller good morning. Thanks for taking my call. Yeah. I was impacted and West Virginia but essentially the whole state, the major problem now is just to give everybody background. West Virginia University the mountaineers. The name of our stadium . Big Pharmaceutical Company run by our senators daughter and oxycontin has been cut back big time which is what got us going and now were getting heroin overdoses because people are turning to the street because our attorney general has done good job of turning back on oxycontin but now heroin honestly from detroit and michigan and just we had to call the National Guard into huntington to try and stop it. So, it seems like theres no end in sight and no help. We could really use help down here is all i can say about it. Nothing seems to be on the up and up at all. Host when you said the attorney general did a good job cutting back on the oxycontin and prescriptions . How did he do that . Lawsuits against pharmaceutical companies . Caller you cant get it here. Its very hard to do. You have to really be injured and prove it which does hurt people thats really injured but at the same time so many people have been hooked on it that its just turned everybody to heroin thats turned to crime and its devastated our state. Were the only state in the union losing population every single year. So its a sad state. I love it. Its my home but what can you do. Host jacob thanks for call. Heres numbers focused on the state level. West virginia had some 52 drug over dose deaths in 2016 per 100,000 people. That places it first in the United States. Ohio is second with 39. 1 Drug Overdose deaths in 2017 per 100,000 people. Ohio 39 and pennsylvania 37. 9. The states with the lowest Drug Overdose death rates. Iowa in 2016 with 10. 6 over dose per 100,000 people. North dakota 10. 6 and texas 10. 1 and south dakota 8 point 4 and nebraska with 6. 4 per 100,000 people, deaths, those are the numbers from center of disease drug over dose report. Were talking about the Opioid Crisis in the first hour of this washington journal and asking you what progress youve seen. Kevin in Salt Lake City this morning. Caller yeah. I wanted to say that you know, i believe that doctors knew these drugs were addictive before they started prescribing them. Its hard for me to believe that you have synthetic opium in heroin and you are a doctor with all that training and you dont believe its addictive . Host i think we lost kevin. James is in pittsburgh, pennsylvania. For those impacted by the Opioid Crisis. James, go ahead. Caller are you there . Host yes, sir. Caller i was running for mayor of pittsburgh. You are talking about its like the alcohol thing. Prohibition that was 13 years. I used to do heroin and smoked crack and did pills and i will never ever touch it again. Ive been in prison and rehabs and detoxes and you name it ive been there and you couldnt pay me to touch it. Look. I chose to do drugs. I chose to do it. People are not being forced to do these drugs they choose to do heroin and pills. Just like that was the most ridiculous thing is 13 years of stupid for prohibition it it was dumbest thing we did and so is this. Host would you say you were addicted. Caller yes. Host how did you beat it . What helped you . Caller a lot of stuff. In and out of jail. I got sick of going in and out of jail and sick of all the losing all my money and all my jobs and everything. My whole life was a wreck and i got sick of it and said thats enough, enough, enough. And i just i locked myself in a hotel room and i was sick for like four taste and its rough. When you start putting that stuff in your body it makes you feel real good. It gives you all this energy and then once you start taking it you get real sick and its like wow you have to keep taking pills to get back your energy. You get real energized and you are like a rock star and once you dont have that dope or pills youre sick and you dont want to get out of bed and then you next thing you know, when it goes in your system but when it comes out, oh my god. Host if you won that election you were running for or been allowed to continue to run what change would you make in pittsburgh . Caller what i would have did in pittsburgh. A lot of infrastructure in school systems. I was going, i was going to run and shoot over to the governor thing and coming up this year and run for Lieutenant Governor but they kicked me off the ballot because of my financial statement. So im independent so i had to get a bunch of signatures and then they take all this graduation. Welcome to the ballot and debate and they sent me papers in the mail. Host will you run again some time . Caller yes, sir. Coming up in 2018 lewis and wager in and im trying to get involved. Thats what i want to do. I have ideas i want to do and if you ask the question ill give to it you. Im talking a little fast but i have my ideas. Host appreciate you sharing your story. Good luck in the next election. In lancaster, ohio. The state with the second most opioid related or Drug Overdose deaths in 2016 according to the lateest report. Caller yes we are. I want to say this. My mother worked at a hospital with heroin addicts for 23 years and i worked at a different place for the ten years and i think narcan is not a good idea. They have these lazarus parties so people can continue to shoot up their heroin. Its one of the things you can shoot up the heroin and then it brings you right back to life but you can go right back to it. You have to go to the hospital after that and i think enough is enough. People need to take responsibility for themselves and if they choose to do drugs they can do drugs and im telling you this, theyre going to find out in a couple of years theyre going to have more overdoses than what they have now. Host you think First Responders and hospitals should be allowed to have it and use it or nobody should have it . Caller i can understand hospitals and paramedics when they come out you know, i mean but thats not whats happening now. Theyre giving it out like its m ms at halloween time and theyre designating a person to give this to the people injecting the heroin and then theyre overdosing and they squirt it up their nose to revive them and enough is enough and if you choose to do drugs and over dose then youll have to do that then i guess, but no im not saying that its wrong for a hospital. Host thanks for call this morning. Few comments on our Facebook Page the question were asking is if youve seen progress in 2017 with the opioid process. Poly says nothing invested in recovery. Jeff sessions wants to throw addicts in jail and trump wants to invest in a just say no media event and sounds like 80s crack epidemic to me and then this one says how about free trade with canada and big pharma runs america and people are just too dumb from aaron. Go after the big opioid pushers instead of giving them huge tax breaks. Were following your comments on facebook and you can join us and give us a call. Our phone lines are split up regionally. Eastern and central is 2027370001 and that line for those impacted by opioids 2026280205. I want to hear your stories. Griffin up next in in florida, good morning. Caller how are you . Host doing well. I was calling to say that i still dont see any progress and i think thats what we shouldnt do. Host you think the Trump Administration is taking this issue more serious than previous administrations . How do you think the president has handled this . Caller its tough to tell. I think that from what ive heard him say on the campaign trail and some of the features in who he hired as his attorney general it seems obvious he wants to take a tough assistance on drugs and i would agree but as far as things theyve a actually done im not sure but this Opioid Crisis seems lower priority in iran and north korea and all the cyber wars and theary can. Theres less than 50,000 people that over dosed last year. Our population is 350 million. Host president of the United States declared the Opioid Epidemic a National Public Health Emergency. Heres the president talking about the extent of the crisis at that event. Last year almost one million americans used heroin and more than 11 million abused prescription opioids. The United States is by far the Largest Consumer of these drugs using more opioid pills per person than any other country in the world. Opioid deaths have quadrupled since 1999 and a count for the majority of fatal Drug Overdoses who would have thought. No part of our society not young or old rich more poor. Your ban or rural has been spared this plague. Drug addiction and this horrible situation thats taking place with opioids. In West Virginia a truly great state, great people theres a hospital nursery. In agony. Because these precious babies were exposed to drugs in the womb. They endured pain and sleeplessness the same as adults undergoing detox. Some of these children will likely lose one or both. Such beautiful terrible measure of the Opioid Crisis including families ripped apart from many communities. This a National Health emergency. What weve seen. Nobody has seen anything like whats going on now as americans we cannot allow this to continue. Its time to liberate our communities from this scourge of drug addiction. Never been this way. We can be the generation that ends the Opioid Epidemic. We can do it. Host and if you missed that event you can go back and watch it all of our events can be seen at cspan. Org but in the wake of the president declaring that National Health emergency. Another bit of reaction last week from democrat from rhode island said the president ial emergency fine to do but called the words to be backed up with funding. Here as twitter video he sent out . I remember visiting borrowville a small town in Northern Iowa of a few thousand people and after the first three months of the year they had six over dose fatalities. Six overdose fatalities in a small town like that is a terrible emotional burden. It was with towns like this in rhode island and families that lost loved ones and mine that i wrote with senator port man the recovery act and got it passed into law. Now that bill is in law, we need to fund it and thats the predicament that congress faces. We have to get money to the Opioid Epidemic. Treatment we need to get on this problem. It didnt free up funding. When we do the funding its imperative that we get Adequate Funding into that measure. Please support getting that done. Host your taking your calls on this topic until 8 00. Its coming up on that we have phone lines for each region. And the last line those impacted by opioids. Go ahead. Caller how you doing . Host im doing well. Caller i served in iran and im retired but at the time i was 20 years old and i stop in 1992 i was on that drug for 22 but i want to say it started snorted heroin it was a recreational drug and then i eventually become addicted and then i graduated from snorting to skin topic to injection. I got the scar right now on my arm but ive been off drugs for 25 year but the thing is that you got to remember they used heroin to substitute morphine and then came up with methadone and then you became addicted to methadone. I got locked up in 92 and you got tired of seeing my mom and everyone behind me and got tired and prayed and said lord you take this away from me. You know what i think . When you incarcerated and that body starts aching youre going to want relief. Like a person with toothache or headache they want to take something to get that pain off and thats what her win does to your body. They start off recreational like they had no oxycontin but you get used to that high. Host i think youve called in before on this same topic am i right about that. Caller i did. I did. Host you think that we turn and corner in 2017 on this . Have we changed as a country and how we think about this or trying to combat it . Caller no, no, no. Because you know they dont even understand what the withdrawal system is helping the people. Know what you have to do . Theres a drug a long time ago to keep people calm. Once you incarcerate the drug patient for two weeks and then theyre given that therapy it makes him sleep and he wont feel those physical withdraws and then you can Start Talking to him then. You understand me . Then you can talk to them because he aint feeling the physical withdrawal and then you communicate with him and showing him a different side hey man, you know you dont have to live like this and this and that. That will help him more than anything in the world man. Let me tell you something john your body start cramping and when that body start acting so bad you just want some relief so bad, your body just from your toes to your head it goes through its a feeling you dont want to have, man. And the only thing you can think about is man i can get me another score. Host i got your point. Thanks for continuing to call in on this topic. Howard in pittsburgh. Go ahead. Caller hello . You know i had open heart surgery and almost died for pnemonia and i never had any pain whatsoever and i guess thats a good thing because my understanding is that a lot of people have medical reasons for asking for a drug and as far as i understand, thats my take on it. Howard you think we as a country are taking this issue more seriously this year . Or doing enough at this point . Why are the numbers continuing to go up and up . Caller we need money. Its going to take money to face this crisis we have and were bankrupt. You know . Thats my take on it. I dont know. Host thanks for call. Rodney is in memphis texas. Caller i dont know about the impact but i started off. Ive had back surgery and i got injured on the job and i have a turn rotator cuff but how i feel i have been impacted i was taking darviset and they take it off the market and the way i feel ive been impacted my doctor made me sign this five page contract and it took me a half a day to read it and i feel ive been impacted because of the addicts i used to get a 90 day supply of pills and this year the president and all these other people that im in a contract and they give me a drug test every now and then to see if i have any Illegal Drugs in my system where i dont use Illegal Drugs and they even test my blood to make sure i have what im taking four pills a day and i have to take them because of the pain. You do, if you dont get your pills like your doctor is out of town i might go two or three days and you do have that feeling like you got the stomach virus and all that but i feel like ive been impacts because people that have abused them and im honest about it and what i take it for and it does relieve my lower back pain and in my shoulders but the people thats taking it honestly and theres other people i talked to and even the doctor was given me a 90 day supply because i go every six month for us check up with him and he said youre going to have to go to your Family Doctor now because we cant have a refill you have to go in every month or hes got to get it from your Family Doctor. So i feel like ive been impacted from it. Thanks for the call this morning. A few tweet as were having this discussion. This issue is just going to allow the government to get more involved in peoples lives get on the government approved place to get your meds. They have marketed opioids like candy but we need to hold the individual executives responsible and they said part of the healthcare system. Trump should Fund Healthcare all for all. And one said wants cspan producers explain how the money people are begging for stem this crisis. Nancy pelosi period at a hearing it was the energy and Commerce Committee that held this hearing in october on allowing members of congress to talk about what they thought they needed to combat the Opioid Crisis and the things they thought would work best. Nancy said this. I believe that it is really important for us to respond to this national with the seriousness and urgency it requires. Fortunately we have had bipartisan ship in passing legislation and the comprehensive act of recovery and we came together in the Bipartisan Legislation that was passed in the 21st century cure act that people were so happy the addition language was in there that day. We heard the stories of families so sad it would break your heart. Families that lost a young teen or 21 years old a matter of weeks before that particular signing that president obama signed that legislation but it had the language it just doesnt have money to adequate extent and thats my appeal for democrats and republicans to Work Together to have the funding to fund the key initiatives authorizing the bill. I want to make a pitch for medicaid. On the expansion was provided a vital lifeline for tens of thousands of americans struggling with addiction. As governor of ohio. Our form eco leagues. Thank god we expanded medicaid because that money helps to rehab people. Yet 19 states have not taken that step. We stand ready to work with you in good faith with republican tossup date and improve the aca but we remain vigilant efforts to gut medicaid because it will create even more of a problem in terms of opioids just to name one thing. Host again all of the hearings are available on the cspan archives and you can see that at cspan. Org. Taking your calls until 8 00 on this issue. Caller good morning. Merry christmas and happy new year. Host same to you. Caller Michael Dyson addressed this few days ago talking about Racial Disparities between those that use heroin and meth that are predominantly white users and the crack epidemic of the 80s and 90s were predominantly black users and what they did in the 80s and 90s they incarcerated pre dominantly africanamerican users and democrats and republicans, democrats are just want to process that. Actually created legislation in order to make mandatory minimums for these drug users who were africanamerican so now we fast forward and we have a quote unquote crisis but its predominantly white users that are addicted to heroin and meth. They throw the book at the africanamerican users. If you look at the prison system africanamericans predominantly africanamerican people you do not see this and white people going to jail over drugs. You do not see that. Michelle alexander talked about this in the book the new jim crow. So what i would like to see is, you know, everyone treated equally under the law. Host what is the right way to treat people on this issue . You think what is happening now is the better way of treating people and locking people up would help stem the crisis were seeing more than 40,000 people die of over dose last year . Caller i hate to say just lock everybody up because you know if they have a problem which i do believe an addiction is a big problem, but like i said before, to make someone just to get off of drugs i dont think, you cant make people get off of drug drugs. So if they go to jail, i assume even though you can get access to drugs in jail too one would assume you have a limited access to drugs in jail so maybe they should go to jail. I dont know what the answer is. All i know is theres not equal in the eyes of the law and that is a problem. Host thanks for call. Maggie in california on the line for those impacted by the Opioid Epidemic. Go ahead. Caller hi. Merry christmas. Im a person that had a very bad back problems. Scoliosis and others i have fractures and i also got sick when i was 34 and have made these things much worse. Lived in california all my life and for four years i was trying to find a doctor that would help me because i was a nurse and it was really impacting my work and i was in so much pain and i would sweat all night and it was i was losing my life to pain. The thing about pain is that its not just the pain. It steals your energy and it steals your vitality and you cant focus on anything else so when you are living in a world of pain, its really horrible and i finally one night was watching 60 minutes with my husband and i saw a doctor being profiled on there named william who was practicing in virginia and i said thats the guy i need to see because he was putting people on oral morphine and they were getting their lives back. These are people some of them had been in wheelchairs and you know on disability and for decades and you know families fell apart and everything ruined. Host how many years have you been on it and has it ever impacted you negatively . Caller well i did go there and get put on it and it gave me my life back and my own doctor in california who was initially against it saw how good i was doing and he said, called me up on a sunday morning at home and said ive been thinking about you and i know what a hardship is it is for you to go to virginia every three months and paying for this out of pocket ill take over prescribing so i was on oral morphine for 15 years and it didnt climb up very much over in the years and i took it regularly and i didnt abuse it and i had to move back to san mateo to take care of my parents who were dying and by this time i had become a widow myself, and had to get medical care somewhere else. I couldnt keep going where i was going it was over 100 miles away. I started get push back. And theyre jerking me around about the medicines and things have changed politically and now theyre not so fast and loose to give you this stuff and they want to get you off it and thats what they tell me they want me to do and im like but i have horrible pain and my condition has only gotten worse. Im not doing anything wrong with my medicine and they just wouldnt an they cut me off. They put me on a come down schedule. They didnt like give me none but then i had nothing for my pain and i tried to deal with that and i lasted four months until the Colder Weather set in and i couldnt deal with it and i found another doctor in fresno and im driving from San Francisco to fresno every month to see this doctor and this other doctor that had kicked me off it called him and said you shouldnt prescribe to her so i got left with nothing. So im high and dry. What do i do now . Im trying to find a doctor who will prescribe for me but you know what . I can find heroin and id never done heroin in my life and i never wanted to do heroin but that was like a whole lot cheaper than id ask people do you know anybody that has any pills to sell or can i get morphine tablets to get one of the tablets i used to take would have been about like 15 a pill. Nine of them a day . Have you done heroin. Caller i have. I spent the last two weeks detoxing. This is my detox christmas. Ive been alone and im coming off it now and its been really horrible and i dont know what im going to do with my pain but i cant afford doing heroin anymore and im not going to sell myself or steal or sell my jewelry you know . Im theres just things im not going to do. Im not going to go into debt for this and basically not affordable for me. I know they say heroin is cheap but youre over 50 white woman i think they jack up the prices and i had to know somebody and that person is not around and then you got to find somebody else who knows somebody and it just just a horrible thing and its a terrible drug. You dont know what its in it and it does awful things to your bodien and its not clean and im thinking all these doctors now are so scared and they dont want to give even people with legitimate medical problems. See friends. Thats you know, right. My journal. Thats the things i wanted to do. Host appreciate you sharing. Sharing your story. Good luck and in the recovery effort and continuing to try to stay off. Give us a call down the road. I want to hear from you again. Were likely talking about the subject down the road in 2018. More callers waiting for you. Gina in daytona florida. Go ahead. Caller yes, thank you for taking my call. I appreciated the womens testimony from california. Gave us an inside feel. Theres a senator ed marky of massachusetts and he wanted to charge he wanted to start like a one percent tax. They started this. When they put the opioids on the market they said it was a one percent chance. One percent of addiction. Thats a lie. Thats a dastardly lie. You have states like West Virginia, ohio and whole cities of people from teenagers to Senior Citizens that are becoming addicted all because of these opioids and like the woman from california said, then you turn to heroin here in florida seven years ago the opioids were being produced, sent from florida all over in the country. It was criminal. The Governor Scott did nothing about it until it got so bad. Theres a lot of Senior Citizens in florida and i have my own theory is that they started to pump them up and they felt good and have access of pills and maybe theyre grandchildren or children getting hold of them and then, well anyway florida became the export of opioids which was a disgrace and then they cracked down. Theyre so afraid of hurting the pharmaceutical companies. Now when trump came out and said that he called it a, i dont think he called it a crisis, i think he worded it a bit different. Host Public Health emergency. Which was in late october when the president declared that. Caller right. Exactly and then he did something which i considered cute. He donate when had he said he was going to do one quarter of his salary, quarterly salary to good causes. He gave a certain amount to the National Parks well thats cute. His administration cut National Parks money. Hes giving now i think this past month he said, im giving it to the Opioid Crisis. Well they cut the National Institute of health. They cut the cdc. I mean who is kidding who here . Host you were talking about a piece of legislation at the beginning of your statement. This may or may not be what youre talking about the budgeting for opioid Addiction Treatment act introduced by senator joe mansion and its called the life tax a one cent stewardship on each milligram of active in a prescription pain pill to fund efforts to access to Substance Abuse treatment and Rebate Program for cancer related pain and exempts drugs used for opioid addiction the paperwork hes put out on the life note that is that the fund coordinating be used to establish new facilities and recruiting and increasing reimbursement for certified medical Health Providers and Substance Abuse and expanding access to longterm programs for addicts and so on. One cent fee on every milligram of opioid produced, it has been cosponsored by a number of senators. The senator was tweeting about its a you saw last week right before Congress Went out of session. Cody is waiting in texas. Caller yeah, its sad. Its like the same old story. The crisis comes and people get addicted but if they remember, its because anytime you went to a doctor no matter if its for a scratch, the doctor would give you oxycontin, knowing very well thats too much for an incident but yet the doctors have prescribed this over and over to everybody and it is a purpose full, im from the streets so i see where the drugs are coming from. Theyre not coming on the backs of mexicans across the border no theyre being shipped over here by our own leaders. Our people need to understand, our leaders are hurting us. Theyre not helping americans one damn bit and we need to wise up and start making these changes or this whole country is dead. Host on the issue of how americans think about pain treatment at that same energy and Commerce Committee hearing from october that we showed nancy pelosi testify at. Mark wayne mullen of oklahoma talked about this issue. We never want to talk about taking medicine backwards but i sit in front of you from a gentlemen whos had surgery since i was a little boy. I was born with my hips out and my feet clubbed and the club feet position and i started having surgeries very young and i built up a large pain tolerance and ive never been one to use Pain Medicine and now my wife says im different than most and i think most people probably agree with that, but i do understand pain. I understand the need for medicine. But in 96 when pain become incensed and in my opinion we let the genie out of the bottle and we started treating it like it was something that can be treated like the cold and the flu and all we do is mask it and weve seen stronger and stronger drugs coming out. Weve seen them become controlled substance and narcotics we sent home in a bottle with prescription and say thats controlled and now we seen an epidemic spread from the middle class, the low class to the wealthy and to our mothers and fathers to our brothers and sisters and coworkers. When do we put the genie back in the bottle. How do we continue to allow addictive drugs continue to be sent home with our loved ones. The highest percentage of death of accidental opioid deaths are mothers. Middle age women. Most of them got addicted after birth or an elective surgery. How is that possible . How do we let this continue to move down that path and not say that we have to do something bold about when its a controlled substance why do we allow to it go home . Wouldnt that be better treated in the hospital . We talk about a lot of remedies but we have to go back to where it started and it started when we started treating it like a sense. Host ten minutes left in the washington journal and were talking asking you if youve seen progress on that issue in 2017 and if so how. What do you think lawmakers and policy makers should do in 2018. Christina is in new jersey. Good morning. Caller good morning. To my fellow americans and i want to wish you happy new year. In this large topic of the opioid christ is, very sad sub topics. First on a personal level. Thanks to the cdc i have lyme disease and as a result of that refusing treatment as they do so many lyme patients i am now in immense pain but i want to share with every american and especially those women that used to go to the doctor and get pain meds and now use heroin. Look up for a Pain Management doctor. I go to a Pain Management doctor and i get drug tested and urine analysis and you feel like youre on parole but due to what were experiencing now those of us in chronic pain we agree to go through this drill soso please dont turn to heroin and please dont give up and look up for a Pain Management doctor. I want to go back to something thats been tearing at my heart for years and that is the beautiful woman who brought up the crack cocaine issue. Years and years and years went by where the black community was infiltrated with this disgusting disease, destroyed so many of our fellow americans and nothing was done. Nothing was done until oh my gosh, now we have a crisis because the blond haired blueeyed suburban young lady had overdosed and now we have so much work to do and i think this is a false um. Show of concern by our elected officials. I think its a political exploit and we as americans have to join our voices together to say that any addiction that addiction is now ruling that person and they need to be put in lock down rehab centers. Those people in high levels are generally white older men who have large houses and beautiful cars are not drug users but they are the ones that are putting that poison in our streets and they are the ones that need to be sent to prison for life. Host well go to greg waiting in california. Go ahead. Caller good morning and happy new year cspan. Ive been looking at this issue and im telling myself, we do not need to curtail the free market in the pharmaceutical industry. What we need to do is go after the criminal deplorable white people that are abusing these drugs. Everyone knows that these white people that abuse these opiois,s this has a criminal mindset and we dont need to Fund Treatment weve already have treatment in the Prison Industries and what we need to provide is additional two weeks in a jail cell to detox them. The only thing were going to be able to do is rid ourselves of this criminal deplorable abusive part of society which is these white people. Host why do you think its just racial lines . Caller well the majority of people addicted on these opioids are white people. One of my best friends is white. My goodness so im not racist but white people have a propensity to abuse drugs. Abuse. Host in california this morning. Both major papers here focusing on this issue of opioid addiction and heroin. First the front page of the Washington Times focusing on Chris Christie who has led president trumps quest to break the stigma of addiction, quoting him as saying well have seen that were, we have begun to remove the stigma of this disease when people willing to impact will demand from their government a response. They dont march today because theyre ashamed because they dont want to be identified. Chris christie saying that the u. S. Finally addressed the hiv aids crisis because americans parading down the streets of washington d. C. And said its time for power brokerings to take Opioid Epidemic seriously and the Washington Post this morning. The lead story or featured story, i should say, is mexicos drug trade hitting home. The story noting after years of supplying the American Market mexican cartels are selling drugs domestically in mexico focusing on that today in the Washington Post. Time for a few more calls. Tracy in ohio on the line for those impacted by Opioid Epidemic. Go ahead. Caller hi. Good morning i want to say thank you for covering this particular topic. My thing is im impacted kind of like some of the other people stated about the difference in the treatment of the addicts because of color. And also its like i feel like people of color did not get the help and services they deserve. Its like no longer a stigma because of the color of the addict and the status of social status of the addict and to me its getting really offensive because when it did not target somebody that looks like most people on t. V. , nobody cared and now all of the sudden its a crisis but the Opioid Crisis does not normally Effect People of color but its affecting higher class white people and now seven all of the sudden concerned and this impacted me and its just the way society is. Most people of color did not get painkillers because doctors didnt prescribe them to them thinking theyre going to abuse them and at that point theyre abused by other people and this is impacting them with total treatment and the way theyre treated. The people doing crack cocaine went to jail and now its like everybodys job to try to help the opioid addict and i just think its totally a disgrace in america how just because what somebody looks like they need help and thats just how i feel. Host tom in california you are also on the line for those affected by this chris sis. Good morning. Caller yes good morning. I was calling because i wanted to say a couple of things first of all about donald trump and him declaring a National Health crisis as apposed to National Health emergency which he originally stated he would declare. The point i would like to make is for the gentleman that was claiming about white people being addicted, it is just completely nonsense. It is complete nonsense. I live in madison, wisconsin, and i have seen multiple drug transactions on the street , people oftes, black all color. I do agree the epidemic of the 1990s and the 1980s was indeed centralized around africanamerican communities, and now mandatory minimums, they have been locked up. I have been arrested twice as a , it is time for a change. Healtht was public emergency and Health Emergency we talked about that in october, when it was happening. If you missed those segments on washington journal, you can watch them anytime at cspan. Org. That will do it for the first segment of washington journal. Next, we are joined by ken stern to talk about his book, republican like me how i left the liberal bubble and learned to love the right. Later, we look at the 2018 elections in the house and senate. We will be joined by Nathan Gonzales of inside elections. We will be right back. Studentcam the tweets say it up. Studentcam in action, Video Editing and splicing for constitutional document is. This group shows us how it is done two stellar interviews in one day. They asked hardhitting questions. We are asking students to choose a provision of the u. S. Constitution and create a video illustrating why it is important. Our competition is open to middle school and High School Students grades six through 12. 100,000 in cash prizes will be awarded. The grand prize of 5,000 will go to the student or team with the best overall entry. The deadline is january 18. Get copperheads details on our website at studentcam. Org. Cspan, where history unfolds daily. Created as aan was Public Service byme