Benzodiazepine, also known as Xanax, Valium, or by the more common street name of “benzos”, has burst onto the American scene as the number of overdose deaths related to them have reached disturbingly high levels.
In 2013, the Center for Disease Control (CDC) reported that about 30 percent of prescription drug overdoses were attributed directly to benzodiazepine, while opioid related overdose deaths took the other 70 percent.
This stunning information was brought to light by Dr. Marcus A. Bachhuber, assistant professor of medicine at Montefiore Medical Center and Albert Einstein College of Medicine in his latest landmark study: Increasing Benzodiazepine Prescriptions and Overdose Mortality in the United States.
The Rise of Benzodiazepine Use
Dr. Bachhuber mentions at length how he expected the prescription and use of benzodiazepine to have either stagnated or be on a steady decline, due to the recent rise in opioid awareness and the overdose related deaths attributed to them.
Unfortunately, the researchers prediction backfired as once they collected data on the use of benzodiazepine in the United States from 1996 to 2013. Looking at the data, the researchers found that in that 18 year period, benzodiazepine use increased by a whopping 67 percent, the highest recorded growth in prescription drug use aside from opioids.
Looking at the data, Dr. Bachhuber deduced that:
“overdoses from benzodiazepines have increased at a much faster rate than prescriptions for the drugs, indicating that people have been taking them in a riskier way over time”.
Due to the data, Dr. Bachhuber believes that the rising numbers of overdoses relating to benzodiazepines are not only a public health concern, but also an epidemic that has been cruising under the radar.
Undoubtedly Bachhuber’s statement might seem hyperbolic at its surface, but diving deeper, it soon becomes apparently easy to see that the numbers are beginning to mimic in the steps of the growing heroin epidemic overtaking the country.
Mixing Benzodiazepine and Death
Not only is benzodiazepines, the second leading cause of overdoses from prescription drugs, growing in use and prescription across the nation, but it’s also commonly mixed together with opioids, the number one leading cause of overdoses from prescription drugs.
While the two main prescription drugs that lead the country in overdose related deaths are often combined and mixed to treat chronic pain, unfortunately they also raise the overall chances for an overdose.
Dr. Gary Reisfield, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Florida says:
“The risk of overdose and death from benzodiazepines themselves is generally low-to-moderate in otherwise health adults… [mixed with other substances] their lethality is magnified”.
Combine this creeping prescription drug usage with the rising rates of alcoholism in the country, and an epidemic is clearly born. Benzodiazepines when mixed with alcohol nearly triples the chances of overdosing, which begs the question: how common is alcoholism?
According to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIH), around 16 million adults over the age of 18 have some kind of alcohol use disorder. That coming from a population of approximately 300 million, makes it to about 7 percent in total. This makes it highly probable that any individual using benzodiazepines would also have an alcohol disorder.
What has lead to this monumental increase of benzodiazepines overdoses over the last decade, and most dramatically over the last 3 years, remains largely unknown. However, what is known is that the overall reason why benzodiazepines are being so commonly used, isn’t a black market for it, but rather it being so heavily prescribed to patients. From the over prescription of benzodiazepines, comes a growing tolerance to it, that creates within itself a type of feedback loop, where even more will then need to be consumed.
Getting Help
While benzodiazepines is used mainly to treat anxiety, it should be noted that there are alternative medicines to take that aren’t as addictive or harmful as benzodiazepines.
Addiction from benzodiazepines is unlikely to slow down nationwide with the way the trends are predicting, but battling against its addictive clutches can undoubtedly be handled by professional addiction specialists. Keep yourself or a loved one from falling victim to this rising epidemic today.