User:Emilyadeliade/Opioid epidemic in the United States

Page Evaluation
The Opioid epidemic in the United States page has a demographics section that focuses largely on the impact of opioids on white Americans and ignores opioid related health disparities in BIPOC communities. For example, a study by the Minnesota Department of Health found that African Americans were two times more likely to die in an opioid overdose, and Native Americans were seven times more likely to die from an opioid overdose than whites. The information about overdose and death rates in BIPOC communities is essential to understanding to opioid epidemic as a whole, and thus needs to be added to the Wikipedia page.

Prof Comments
WOW this page is so long, as is the talk section!! I think it's fair to consider suggesting a way to splinter this page into several, such that it would be a more efficient reading experience. There's some sort of accepted "limit" on article length but it's not enforced and I'm not sure what that number is. But, if you have an opinion about it, having looked over the page, feel free to also suggest what parts of it might effectively stand alone as a separate page that this one links to. I'm thinking in particular the in depth state by state data... I absolutely agree that there is quite a gap in terms of race here, so I emphatically support your suggestions. More source suggestions would be good. Race I *think* is more of a factor in urban incidences (see here https://ocme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/ocme/page_content/Opioid%20related%20Overdoses%20Deaths%204.20.21%20FINAL.pdf) --- and I know there are more reports, including a particularly impactful 2019 one that I can't find right now but our materials for Tuesday refer to it... Thanks so much for taking this one on. Let me know if you have any questions. When you post to the talk page be sure to share context about yourselves and our course, and to also engage with any existing relevant comments on there! Liliput000 (talk) 15:30, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

Article Draft
Hello! We are two students at Georgetown University taking a class called Medicine, Race, and Gender. As part of our class, we have done research on racial disparities in the opioid epidemic that we felt would be a helpful contribution to this page.

The demographics section of this page focuses on the opioid epidemic as it relates to white Americans, and while the U.S. opioid epidemic primarily affects whites in rural areas, there are specific racial disparities that are important to note. As of 2018, opioid-involved overdose death (OOD) rates are increasing at a faster rate in African American populations than in white populations, revealing a failure of public health initiatives to curb overdoses in these communities. The opioid epidemic is not just a problem among white people-- it affects racial minority groups as well, particularly Black and Indigenous people of color (BIPOC), and this page doesn’t have much information on its impact on these groups.

The Minnesota Department of Health found that Black Minnesotans are 2 times more likely and Native Americans in Minnesota are 7 times more likely to die of an opioid overdose than white Minnesotans are. A 2021 report published by the DC Office of the Chief Medical Examiner found that 84% of those who died from an opioid overdose in Washington, DC from 2016 to 2021 were Black. Due to a common media portrayal of the opioid epidemic as a problem primarily for whites in rural areas, prevention strategies are often targeted to those areas and thus fail to include initiatives to assist BIPOC who are abusing opioids, often lacking culturally sensitive practices. Furthermore, given the history of the “War on Drugs”-- which originally targeted the crack epidemic, primarily perceived as a Black epidemic-- and its impacts on Black Americans abusing opioids like heroin, culturally sensitive approaches are needed to prevent further opioid abuse in BIPOC communities. When prevention strategies are targeted only at rural, white communities, people of color are deprived of essential resources.

In order to fully understand the opioid epidemic in the United States, this information must be included on this Wikipedia page.