A headline in the March 11, 2026 edition of Stars and Stripes caught my eye recently: “VA plans to seek public guardianship for some veterans […]
OUT OF BOUNDS: (NOT) SAFE AT HOME
Guest post by Grace Fogarty For Jo, who did not fail, but rather, was failed When last I guest posted on this blog, I was […]
(NOT) SAFE AT HOME
Guest Post by Grace Fogarty IN THE BEGINNING . . . The week of March 16th, when COVID-19 first emerged as an urgent threat to […]
The “Harmfuls” of Shame-based Drug Treatment Programs
The “Harmfuls” exercise pasted in below was sent to me by my friend Grace Fogarty. She currently lives in a residential substance abuse treatment program […]
How Opioid Abuse Took Root In Weymouth – And What Can Be Done About It
For a copy of the report contact Susan Sered: ssered@suffolk.edu In 2018 I conducted research in Weymouth, Massachusetts, a town hit hard by the current opioid […]
Institutional Betrayal: Roots of the Opioid Crisis
In an April 2018 post (Gender, Race, Class and the Root Causes of the Opioid Crisis) I laid out data indicating that the opioid crisis […]
Gender, Race, Class and the Root Causes of the Opioid Crisis
Bills aimed at tackling the opioid epidemic are making their way through nearly every state legislature in the country. But as in all public health crises, […]
A Plan to Tackle the Opioid Crisis: The Good, the Bad, and the Missing
The “CARE Act,” a bill addressing the opioid crisis, is moving its way through the Massachusetts legislature’s Joint Committee on Mental Health, Substance Use and […]
Substance Abuse and Social Capital
While the Donald Trump / Jeff Sessions administration is working to re-invigorate the war on drug users, a number of new studies look at relationships between social […]
Involuntary Hospitalization of Drug Users Is Bad Policy
Note: This essay was originally published in TruthOut, November 19, 2015. I’ve reposted it today because calls for involuntary hospitalization are again popping up around […]