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Study: Children of Opioid Users More Likely to Attempt Suicide

by Reuters

   The U.S. opioid crisis is taking a toll on children of users as a study
   published on Wednesday showed they were more likely to attempt suicide.

   The study in JAMA Psychiatry published by the American Medical
   Association found children whose parents were prescribed opioids were
   twice as likely to attempt suicide as the offspring of people who did
   not use those drugs.

   The latest study from researchers at the University of Chicago and the
   University of Pittsburgh is the first research attempting to tie rising
   suicides among U.S. children to the opioid crisis.

   "I think that it's obvious in many ways; it's just that we were able to
   put it together and prove it," said Dr. David Brent, one of the authors
   of the study.

   Brent, of the University of Pittsburgh, said he believes some opioid
   users might display less care, monitoring and affection for their
   children, which would explain the higher suicide rate in those kids.

   Suicide increased across all ages in the United States between 1999 and
   2016, spiking by over 30% in half the country, the U.S. Centers for
   Disease Control and Prevention reported last year.

   Another study found that among girls age 10 to 14 the suicide rate rose
   by 12.7% per year after 2007.

   In the latest study, researchers used medical insurance data from 2010
   to 2016 for more than 300,000 children ages 10 to 19, and broke that
   group down into those whose parents were prescribed opioid drugs and
   those whose parents were not.

   Among the children of parents who used opioids, 0.37% attempted
   suicide, compared to 0.14 % of the children of non-users, according to
   the study, which was funded by the National Institutes of Health.

   The parents were all legally prescribed opioids that they used for at
   least a year. The study did not identify which of those users may have
   been abusing painkillers, as opposed to using them in line with doctor
   recommendations.

   Challenges for children of drug users

   Children of opioid users still had a significantly higher risk of
   attempting suicide after researchers adjusted for factors such as
   depression and parental history of suicide.

   Some researchers have suggested social media could harm children's self
   esteem and increase their suicide risk.

   But Brent and his co-authors noted social media is prevalent in
   countries that have not seen a rise in child suicide.

   U.S. President Donald Trump declared the opioid crisis a public health
   emergency in October 2017 and has promised to hold drugmakers
   accountable for their part in the crisis.

   Nearly 400,000 people died of overdoses between 1999 and 2017 in the
   United States, resulting in the lowering of overall life expectancy for
   the first in more than 60 years, according to data from the Centers for
   Disease Control and Prevention.

   Eric Rice, an associate professor at the University of Southern
   California's school of social work, said other research has found
   children of drug users face challenges.

   "A doubling in the suicide rate is a pretty shocking manifestation of
   that, I've got to be honest," Rice said. "But to hear that there are
   impacts on children which are negative is not a surprising thing," said
   Rice, who was not involved with the study.