In the past Sioto County’s Portsmouth, Ohio gained a reputation for successful shoes companies, as well as the shoestring company that employed many of its residences. Portsmouth was part of the “Rust Belt” in America as a big manufacturer of steel. Portsmouth produced some household names who played in the Major Leagues like Al Oliver and Gene Tenace, while across the river came Don Gullett. Who could talk baseball without mentioning the influence of local hero, Branch Rickey, the Dodger’s General Manager who signed Jackie Robinson? From an iconic marker who couldn’t think of Portsmouth without the pool, Dream Land, where friends and family gathered at the park to swim, eat and dream away the summer days.
But those days are past. The shoe companies abandoned the region. The steel factories shut down. Portsmouth’s presence in the Major Leagues has been quiet. And the Dream Land pool has been filled in and paved for a strip mall.
In the void, Portsmouth became Ground Zero for the opioid crisis. According to Sam Quinones’ book, Dream Land, a perfect storm converged that hit in Portsmouth. First came the pharmaceutical companies who perpetuated a misinformed and fallible research belief that opioids were virtually non-addictive. The pharmaceutical industry believed they found the solution to controlling pain without fear of addiction; they were wrong. The second gathering storm was the “Pill Mill” factories, where doctors, focused on pain management, set up practice for the purpose of dispensing the opioids. What emerged was an industry without regulation being run by many doctors who had lost their license to practice. Patients paid in cash and were given, what turned out to be, an open ended prescription to opioids like OxyContin, Percocet and Vicodin (honest doctors were caught in the middle of either prescribing for pain or being seen as insensitive to patients pain). Finally, smuggled in from a small state in Mexico came the Black Tar Heroin. In a “pizza delivery” format, the Mexicans sold heroin, to white middle-class people in bigger cities like Columbus, Ohio and to smaller towns like Portsmouth. Instead of you going to a crack house or allies, they delivered to you in a public area. The price was cheap, accessible, and the product was potent. Many who were addicted to opioids eventually became hooked on this form of heroin.
Living in the wake of this perfect storm is certainly better than the storm itself. Federal regulators finally stopped the Pill Mill industry and held the pharmaceutical industry accountable for the damage done. Law enforcement agencies figured out how the Black Tar Heroin ring was operating and started convicting dealers to long-term prison sentences. Most importantly, family members of drug addict victims started speaking out to remove the stigma and shame of their loved one being an addict. What happened to them could have easily happened to anyone, anywhere.
As Quinones drew conclusions to his opioid story, he noted the important role community plays in heading off addiction and gaining support while recovering from addiction. For thirty years our society has barricaded itself within its homes believing that it’s safer than engaging the world. The opioid crisis struck at this belief as the ones hit hardest by the crisis were the white middle-class who believed their home was a sanctuary. It’s time to engage our neighborhood community. Also, our prison system needs to look at the role they play in helping recovering addicts. Simply locking up addicts without long term drug intervention will not curb the epidemic nor the addiction. Finally, churches must rethink their role in staying off the drug epidemic. One church in Portland, Oregon started with the intent of sharing the gospel with addicts. Their teachings focusing on Jesus: love, forgiveness and transformation. They’re known as “The Rehab Church.”
Church is the first and last line of defense in surviving the Dream Land. Church provides a built-in community needed for an alternative to a destructive lifestyle and a protection against drugs and the drug world. Church provides a venue for confession to transpire, confessing either an addiction or the battle a family member is fighting. Church provides the grace to struggle along with the cushion to fail and to fall without fear. Church provides the hope for a recovering community to succeed.
Soli Deo Gloria!
(i.e. only God is glorified!)