As I followed this story, I took as given that kicking opiate addiction required a dozen attempts at rehabilitation. The figure I kept hearing was one in ten—the number of people who succeeded in each rehab. That was true, Whitney said, only because so few people get the full treatment they need. Too often they go in for three weeks or six weeks. Brain chemistry needs far more time to recover from the blast it takes from opiates. “We have as good or better treatment results as they do for asthma or congestive heart failure—if we have the tools to work with,” he said. “But people do not get
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