Before I started writing this blog, I had some definite opinions about drug addiction, alcohol abuse, and the people who struggled with those problems. I thought I knew some stuff about those issues. Now? Eh, I’m not so sure.

The more I learn about addiction and substance use disorder, the more I find out how little I actually know. How much I have yet to learn.

This newfound knowledge has changed some of my longstanding opinions about addiction. Drug addicts aren’t junkies huddling in crack houses. Alcoholics aren’t just uncles who get tipsy and loud during family wedding receptions. (But enough about my family.) No, drug and alcohol abuse is everywhere. Its sufferers can be anyone, even a loved one or two.

Drug addiction touches every area of the United States. In Florida in 2013, 199 people had fatal heroin overdoses in 2013. Just a year later, this number doubled, as 447 Florida residents had fatal heroin overdoses.

Clear across the country, Alaska is experiencing its own problems with heroin. In 2013, twenty-three people died due to heroin overdoses in Alaska. This was four times as many Alaskans who died from heroin in 2008.

Other areas of the country are wrestling with heroin. In the metropolitan area of Detroit, Michigan one bus line is known as the Heroin Express because so many heroin users travel this route to score drugs.

All of these instances demonstrate that drugs are not isolated to urban areas, or confined to one part of the country. Drugs are everywhere, and so are people who are struggling with substance use disorder. As depressing as this sounds, it means that more people are learning about substance use disorder and the problems it causes. This knowledge could help them better understand and ultimately tackle such substance use disorder problems.