Dovetailing with a surge in overdose deaths, the United States has seen a sharp rise in seizures of illicit fentanyl, according to a new report.

Law enforcement seizures of pills containing illicit fen...

The U.S. drug epidemic continues its death march, with new research showing American teens and young adults have lost nearly 1.5 million years of life due to drug overdose deaths in recent years.

For the study, the researchers examined years of life lost -- the difference between a person's e...

No magic bullet exists for ending the U.S. opioid crisis, but there's hopeful news for one high-risk population: Providing addiction medication in jails reduces the odds of addicts being re-arrested after their release, new research shows.

"Studies like this provide much-needed evidence and momentum for jails and prisons to better enable the treatment, education and support systems that i...

At least 59 overdoses were prevented in the first three weeks that two overdose prevention centers have been open in New York City, the city's health department said Tuesday.

During that time, there were more than 2,000 visits to the centers that are operated by OnPoint NYC and are the first publicly recognized overdose prevention sites to open in the United States. The city first

There may be a silver lining to the COVID-19 pandemic, with U.S. health officials reporting an "unprecedented" decline in teens' use of alcohol, marijuana, other illegal drugs and vaping.

"We have never seen such dramatic decreases in drug use among teens in just a one-year period," said Dr. Nora Volkow, director of the U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse.

"These data are unpreced...

A wearable device that could inject a lifesaving antidote for an opioid overdose might be on the horizon.

A new study shows that the device, worn on the stomach like an insulin pump, can detect when someone stops breathing from an overdose and inject the drug naloxone to restore breathing.

"Fatal drug overdoses in the United States are at an all-time high, and opioid overdoses accou...

Teenagers have followed the vaping trend into marijuana use, with recent studies chronicling a boom in pot vaping among adolescents in the United States and Canada, researchers report.

The percentage of teens who've experimented with vaped pot has more than doubled in recent years, and vaping among frequent marijuana users has quadrupled, according to the study.

Currently about 1 in...

Researchers may be one step closer to developing the equivalent of a Breathalyzer for detecting marijuana use.

In an early study, scientists found that their rapid test was able to reliably detect THC in people's saliva in under 5 minutes. THC, short for tetrahydrocannabinol, is the active ingredient in marijuana.

Right now, the "gold standard" for detecting marijuana use is to meas...

Drug overdose deaths in the United States hit a new record for the 12-month period ending March 2021, new government data shows.

A record high 96,779 drug overdose deaths occurred between March 2020 and March 2021, representing a 29.6% rise, new statistics from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Health Statistics found. The numbers are provisional, ...

Use of stimulants among college students was once thought to be a problem among high achievers seeking energy and focus to study.

Not so, according to new research that links misuse of these so-called "study drugs" to binge drinking and marijuana use. The stereotype of students bumming a prescription medication like Adderall or Ritalin to study is off the mark, it suggests.

"Stimula...

The COVID-19 pandemic has shaken up the U.S. opioid crisis in ways bad and good, increasing the risk of use and overdose but also spurring innovative approaches to treatment.

The pandemic has definitely been linked to an increase in opioid use and overdose deaths, Tufts University's Thomas Stopka said during a HealthDay Now video interview.

"We've been seeing increases in o...

For those who smoke or drink, it's only a small step to marijuana, researchers report.

"Legal consumption of alcohol and tobacco may directly increase the level of illicit drug use. However, the relationships are complex," said researcher Dr. Zoe Reed. She is a senior research associate in the Tobacco and Alcohol Research Group at the University of Bristol in the United Kingdom.

The...

People buying pills that look like prescription opioid painkillers or stimulants who are not buying them from a licensed pharmacy may be buying a lethal drug, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration warned this week.

This was the first public safety alert the DEA has issued in six years, CNN reported.

Many of these counterfeit pills are laced with fentanyl and methamphetam...

Deaths from methamphetamine overdoses in the United States nearly tripled between 2015 and 2019, health officials report in a new study.

While the number of methamphetamine users did not increase as steeply, researchers said frequent use of methamphetamine, and using other drugs at the same time, may have contributed to the increase in overdose deaths. Meth users have also become more div...

An animal tranquilizer, xylazine, is increasingly linked to drug overdose deaths across the United States, health officials say.

According to a new report from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, xylazine has turned up in overdose deaths in 25 of 38 states examined. In 2019, xylazine contributed to death in 64% of cases and almost always also involved fentanyl.

The ...

Hospitalized opioid addicts die at a rate similar to people who have a heart attack after leaving the hospital.

Nearly 8% of patients addicted to opioids died within 12 months of hospital discharge, according to researchers from Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU).

"We need systems that can address comprehensive needs of people with substance use disorder and serious medical i...

Fully half of all young adults with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) may also battle alcohol or drug abuse.

And folks with ADHD who have a history of depression or anxiety are particularly vulnerable to substance abuse problems, a new study showed.

"People with ADHD may be self-medicating with drugs or alcohol to keep their depression under control, and of course, th...

Overdose deaths linked to illicit "designer" benzodiazepines have surged in the United States, as underground labs crank out new synthetic variations on prescription tranquilizers like Valium, Xanax and Ativan.

Overdose deaths involving illicit benzos increased more than sixfold (520%) between 2019 and 2020, rising from 51 to 316, according to data from 32 states and the District of Colum...

There's been a sharp rise in opioid-related cardiac arrests in the United States and they now equal those associated with other prime causes, a new study finds.

Of more than 1.4 million cardiac arrest hospitalizations nationwide between 2012 and 2018, more than 43,000 (3.1%) occurred in opioid users, and there was a significant increase in opioid-associated cardiac arrest over the seven-y...