Addiction Is A Crisis, Not A Character Flaw: US Surgeon General

MIAMI, , (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 17th Nov, 2016 ) - Alcoholism and drug abuse are a pressing public health crisis in the United States, and addiction should no longer be dismissed as a "character flaw," top US health officials said Thursday.

For the first time, the US surgeon general, Vivek Murthy, released a major report on substance abuse, called "Facing Addiction in America: The Surgeon General's Report on Alcohol, Drugs, and Health." The report "aims to shift the way our society thinks about substance misuse and substance-use disorders," Murthy said.

"Substance-use disorders represent one of the most pressing public health crises of our time," he said in a statement. "We must help everyone see that addiction is not a character flaw -- it is a chronic illness that we must approach with the same skill and compassion with which we approach heart disease, diabetes, and cancer." Some 21 million Americans struggle with a substance-use disorder, which is higher than the number of people who have cancer, the report said.