Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company that Addicted America

by Beth Macy

“But the moment it crossed those boundary lines from the inner city into the suburbs, it became an ‘epidemic,’” said Dabney, shaking his head. After two drug-related jail stints, he left court-ordered treatment in the late 1990s to get a master’s in counseling and now works as a mental health and substance abuse counselor who leads support groups for users taking the maintenance drug buprenorphine, or bupe (more commonly known by the brand name Suboxone). “It’s ludicrous, this thing that’s been knocking on your door for over a hundred years, and you’ve ignored it until finally it’s like a battering ram taking your doors off the hinges. “It’s a monster now, but nobody paid any attention to it until their cars were getting robbed, and their kids were stealing their credit cards.” The worst of it, Dabney warned, was that people were getting hooked at even younger ages, and making the switch faster from pills to heroin.