I watched Lisa Ling’s program on CNN Saturday night dealing with the LDS Drug problem. (A short preview is available here.) On the one hand, it was unremarkable. Drug users (in any community) say that they want to stop doing drugs, but are very flaky and keep doing them. LDS users are no different. On the other hand, Lisa highlighted the unique aspects of the LDS drug problem.
The Word of Wisdom was a key aspect of the program. Yes, Mormons don’t drink and don’t smoke. We believe in clean living. But we do go to the doctor and are prescribed all kinds of legal drugs, so Ling referred to that as a gray area. Utah has more deaths from prescription drug overdoses than from car accidents, and Utah has the highest death rate from prescription drugs in America. Lisa said it was very hard to get Mormons to talk on camera about the problem, and the secrecy is part of the problem with addiction. She highlighted that Mormons try to be perfect, so much so that we don’t like to air our dirty laundry to the neighbors for fear of being judged. That just seems to feed the addiction problem.
As she was talking about this perfection problem, she was careful to say that Church leaders are not the source of the drug problem. However, there is a culture of perfection that seems to indirectly lead some to addiction. There seems to be a strong desire to be perfect, to look good at all times, to have it all together. When one doesn’t have it all together, then anxiety sets in. Pills for pain or anxiety lessen the anxiety, and certain people escape this anxiety through prescription drugs because they are prescribed by doctors, so therefore they are still obeying the Word of Wisdom. The drugs make you less anxious, and pretty soon, you feel you need these drugs every day just to function. One woman, a grandmother, took pills to make her feel less anxious. She finally passed out in front of some guests and spent several months in drug rehab (at $30,000 per month!) The problem takes place in both upscale neighborhoods of Salt Lake City, as well as rural enclaves in Manti in Sanpete County.
I guess the most shocking thing in the documentary was the point where Lisa Ling joined an undercover cop and they were looking for illegal drug transactions just 3 blocks from the Salt Lake Temple. One drug addict has a prescription for Ritalin due to her ADHD. Rather than take them herself, she takes her 90 pills and sells them for $10 per pill to others, making a hefty profit. Then she turns around and buys harder drugs like heroin or meth.
Ling filmed an LDS Addiction Recovery program meeting, modeled after the 12-step program for Alcoholics Anonymous. She also interviewed an LDS Bishop about the problem (the LDS Church did not want to provide an official spokesman for the documentary.) We just don’t hear much about drug abuse from church leaders in General Conference. Should we hear about it more? I am reminded that John Dehlin has said that the porn problem in the LDS Church is because Church leaders harp on it so much, making the problem worse; yet they don’t talk about the prescription drug abuse problem. Does it really matter what church leaders harp on? Because Utah seems to lead the U.S. in a problem they don’t talk about (prescription drugs), but also leads in porn use that they harp on constantly. Is the Church damned if you do, damned if you don’t? What should be done to limit these two problems in particular? The people who were willing to speak on camera did so precisely because they said the problem was hidden, and they wanted to take away the stigma. What are your thoughts?
Wheat & Tares 
I watched it and had several observations:
1. I thought it interesting that the perfection thing was quite prevalent in the entire hour, but most of the people took great pains not to blame the Church for it. In contrast, to some of our well-known critics, it is all the Church’s fault. it seems to underscore the idea that many members are confused about the concept and that they really seem to care more about what others think of them than actually “becoming more like heavenly Father and Jesus.” the operative word being “becoming.” Seems to me more can be done to explain this better to members.
2. Nothing about the doctors involved who seems to hand out this stuff willy-nilly. Oxycontin for a sprained ankle? I couldn’t even get it when I had my knee surgery and the doctor would only prescribe a moderate pain killer for a week and then I was on Motrin. It seems to be a big problem that so many doctors just hand out pills of all kinds just based on a few “reported” symptoms. I’ve seen this in my family situations as well. I’d spend a lot more time looking at the medical community rather than the abusers. The medical world seems to be as big a “pusher” as any other group.
3. I know that area of SLC. We didn’t go near there this trip out there, but I’ve been around there before. It’s near the Plasma donation area and a lot of people hanging out pan-handing. I remember years ago, a guy approaching me and asking for money for food right in front of a restaurant down there and when I offered to go in and buy him food, he refused.
In the end, I think the medical community needs to do more to stop the abuse before it starts. Too many pills are given to people who may not really need them and then they get hooked. I personally never saw that effect when I’ve needed to take pain meds right after surgery. But, my doctor’s refused to refill them and I went to over the counter stuff.
Is it an “LDS Drug Problem” or a Utah/SLC drug problem? I didn’t watch the program, so I don’t know if the focus was on Small Town Utah, Big Valley Provo to Logan, or if there has been some study of all Latter-day Saints spread over the globe that says members are more inclined to overuse prescription drugs than the general population. Presuming it was mostly a SLC/Happy Valley syndrome, then the “perfection” angle falls by the way side. Meaning, the rest of the LDS population would reflect the same high percentage of abuse. Leaders have addressed addiction in all its forms, and we’ve had an Addiction Recovery meeting at our building for about 10 years now. Like Bro. Spector, I personally think a good share of the blame goes to the doctors who over prescribe. We’ve had several doctors over the years face federal charges for over prescribing and running pill clinics. We have people (non-members) in my area hooked on prescription drugs. I’m not sure how anyone could collect the type of data needed to say Utah has a bigger problem with it than anywhere else in the USA. And it seems like there’s a meth lab bust every other day.
Elder Ballard did a really powerful talk about drug abuse which focused on prescription drugs a few years ago (OCt. 2010). Every word of wisdom related lesson that I have attended in Utah at least mentions prescription drugs and the danger of addiction. While there can always be more done, I think the Church is doing what it can to oppose drug addiction of this sort.
I too am suspicious of whether this is an LDS culture problem or a Utah or SLC culture problem.
If the prescription overdose death rate is higher in Utah, that might still mean that the overall drug overdose rate is still lower, prescription drugs being more of a focus for naive users like those from LDS culture. Naïveté in LDS culture might also explain why overdoses are more common because drug culture is not as informed, careful, and maybe more addicted because of LDS guilt-mongering.
But studies would have to be much more sophisticated to tease out the real implications of LDS culture on drug use.
Oh, there’s been GC talks and snippets in talks about Drugs in the past so the Leaders know about it!
Jeff, I agree. I think the Utah Medical Association should do something to address this problem with both physicians and pharmacists.
IDIAT, the program only talked to LDS drug users, so it was geared toward an LDS drug problem. (But I’m sure that non-LDS in Utah also have a problem.) It was billed more as a secret problem among the LDS, and was a way to more fully publicize the problem that is mostly hidden.
The show said the problem was in both big city Salt Lake, as well as small cities like Manti. They detailed drug users in SLC, and spent considerable time on a 20-year old athlete in Manti that died from a drug overdose. His “friends” dumped his body off in a driveway; his father found him and tried CPR but was too late. CNN indicated it was a problem in both large and small towns in Utah.
I think that Utah has a much smaller problem with alcoholism than other states. Alcohol in the church is seen as a Word of Wisdom violation, so quite often (but not always) the drunks are non-members. I suspect if you were to combine the drug and alcohol intoxication, then Utah would not be abnormally high compared to other states. It just seems unusual that Utah’s problem is with legal prescriptions, and the church can take credit for lower alcoholism in the state. Because of the stigma with alcohol, members turn to legal drugs instead of alcohol, so it seems like the problem has just shifted from alcohol to prescriptions. I do agree that some members are more naive to drugs (Ling highlighted that in the show), so perhaps that explains the abnormally high death rate from overdose of prescription drugs.
For those interested, back in 2009 I did a short review of “Happy Valley”, a film at the LDS Film Festival that discussed the prescription drug problem in Utah. I recommend the film.
Has a study been done on links with pharmaceutical companies and the prescribing doctors? I ask since Jeff’s anecdote seems to point to much higher rates of prescribing compared to his experience.
My thoughts on this (as a surgeon practicing in Utah):
– There is very little link between pharmaceutical companies and physicians regarding these drugs. The majority of pain pills prescribed have been around for a long time and are generic. Pharmaceutical companies don’t waste money promoting generic meds.
– This is a large societal problem. The big upturn in the use of narcotics occurred around 15-20 years ago when the nurses suggested that doctors weren’t being ‘sensitive’ to our patients’ pain. There was a big push to rate pain as the “fifth vital sign” and push for prescriptions to reduce the pain level. Since then, the number of deaths from narcotics has skyrocketed. In the US, we currently use 90%+ of the world’s narcotics, and 99% of the world’s hydrocodone (found in Lortab, Norco, Vicodin, etc) and now being released, much to the dismay of everyone in the medical field, as a time-release version much like Oxycontin. In today’s US society, no one wants to suffer anything, but wants a pill.
– It is a huge problem in Utah. Even in DMBA (the insurance arm of the Church – insuring tens of thousands of people – BYU employees, Church employees, seminary and institute teachers, church-businesses, etc.) the top three classes of drugs prescribed are: anti-depressants, narcotics, and anti-anxiety drugs (ie. Xanax, Valium, etc). So even our most stalwart members whose livelihoods are intimately intertwined with religion are using these in large quantities.
– In my opinion – there is definitely a relationship between the Church and the use of these medications. There are 2 reasons:
– 1) We are a works-based church. We teach steps that we have to do, and ordinances that we have to accomplish to return to God. Simply relying on Christ’s grace isn’t enough. If it was, we wouldn’t spend so much on temples. And day-to-day, everyone has calling, home and visiting teaching, daily scripture reading, and etc etc etc. The pressure to be “perfect” in Utah is fairly high in the LDS culture. It’s not necessarily taught by the church, but it’s there – it’s the white elephant in the room.
2) Our “code of health” has nothing to do with health – it’s about obedience. 90% of the world uses caffeine in some form or another. Even though no studies show coffee or tea are harmful in moderation (and are in fact beneficial), we instead drink the same caffeine in sodas and energy drinks. They are terrible. And while a glass of wine at the end of the day (again, in moderation) is not harmful, and is in fact arguably healthy, we also can’t drink that – so we instead fill ourselves with artificial anti-depressants, narcotics, and anti-anxiety medications because they are “OK” since people like me prescribe them.
Ultimately, life is hard. It would be nice if we could rely only on gospel principles to have peace, but the reality is that doesn’t work all the time. At times, all societies throughout the world have relied on “something” to take the edge off intermittently for thousands of years. They are codified such as “having a drink with a friend”, or “having a glass of wine with dinner”, or “drinking a toast”, or sharing kava, or whatever. It is ubiquitous. Since these normal, societal things are banned by our “code of health”, in Utah we instead turn to things that are “legal” per the Word of Wisdom, and we seek out narcotics or other similar drugs.
And as seen on the CNN show, our “code of health” is ironically killing us.
I suspect this is more of a Utah problem. I have been a member all my life and have lived in the midwest/southwest all my life. The only members I have seen with the prescription drug problems have been from Utah, more specifically the SLC area. The Word of Wisdom is not “killing us”, it is people’s screwy application of the principles found within it.
It’s also pretty difficult to claim our health code is killing us when we, on average, live longer than most other segments of the population.
Mike, can you explain why Utah doctors seem to prescribe more pain/anxiety meds than the next state over like Colorado? Are you saying that physicians play no role in this problem?
“There is very little link between pharmaceutical companies and physicians regarding these drugs. The majority of pain pills prescribed have been around for a long time and are generic.”
It means that you have to prescribe a ton of pills to make any money! Let’s not fool ourselves.
#11 May I turn that question around and ask what a doctor is to do if a patient presents with the symptoms of depression or anxiety?
The UT suicide rate is 15.79 per 100K compared with the national rate of 11.29. There are about 25 attempted suicides for each suicide death. Depression, anxiety and hopelessness are specifically identified causes of suicide.
Meanwhile, living with depression and anxiety has mental health consequences for family members, especially impressionable dependent children. That would pretty much put them at greater risk of mental health vulnerability and possibly suicide ideation over the course of their lives.
And, of course, there are those quality of life and productivity things to consider as well.
So I ask the question again, what is a doctor to do if a patient presents with actual symptoms?
PS Would it make any difference to say that in UT males in every age group had higher suicide rates than women by about a factor of 7?
And my information comes from The Center for Disease Control and the UT Dept. of Health.
my husband had a heart attack all the drugs used for recovery are very dangerous and addictive. There are other ways to treat these problems with natural medicine but of course we arent given those because they wouldnt make the doctors or drug companies money. So we get addicted to the drugs. Then when you realize it and start to do something about it they come at you with psycho docs that do hypno therapy on you and then you end up following what they tell you to do. IE leave your spouse/family so they cant heal you and so the docs can continue to make money off ya. This is what happened to my marriage. He tryed to commit suicide due to their drugs and hypno therapy telling him that I was the problem. Not that their drugs that caused suicide was. My husband is ADHD and very passive so he is following them. I miss my husband and know this is all wrong. But they say you have to let him make the desissions. Well when you are mentally ill you can not make sound disisions. This is where the BIBLE laws of GOD come into the picture. You are suppost to help your spouse when they are down. Its been over a year now and they are still trying to get him to send me divorce/legal separation papers. I have made myself clear that I will tear them up will not sign them because i dont have to becausse GODS law says he cant leave me only for adultry. and i havent nor will i ever commit adultry. God says his laws override mans if mans interfear with his. Divorce is against Gods laws. So how do i get my husband out of their control???????
all the mormons i knew were in their own world. the last person i knew always had dialated eyes and was stick thin, and not really connected to reality. his father was a pharmacist….