Heroin-Related ER Visits among Millennials on the Rise in California

Emergency room (ER) visits related to heroin have been rising steadily in California among all age groups, but recent statistics have shown a large increase in millennials in particular.

The Los Angeles Daily News found that “in the first quarter of 2016, 412 adults in their twenties visited emergency rooms in California because of heroin—double the number for the same time period in 2012” (Burch, 2017). 2015 saw a 50 percent increase from 2012 in millennials with heroin issues in the ER, with 1,500 cases. The rate actually tripled in Orange County, California, from 2010 to 2016 (Burch, 2017).

“It’s no longer people from the seedy side of town,” says Dr. Crescenzo Pisano, who has been working at California’s Providence Little Company of Mary Medical Center since 1984 (Burch, 2017). According to Jody Waxman, who has a son addicted to heroin, “For millennials, because of what they are going through in their lives, not being able to handle feelings and past traumas, they can get heroin anywhere from on any street corner” (Burch, 2017).

References

Burch, K. (2017). California sees increase in millennials coming to emergency rooms because of heroin. Retrieved from https://www.thefix.com/california-sees-increase-millennials-coming-emergency-rooms-because-heroin