FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

            The opioid crisis has been devastating American through a growing epidemic that shows no signs of abating.  Instead, drug addiction and drug overdoses have been sweeping through communities of all races and ethnicities nationwide.  The exact statistics vary from different sources, but the costs are over $78.5 billion a year including the costs of healthcare, lost productivity, addiction treatment, and criminal justice involvement, according to the National Institute of Drug Abuse.  And the numbers of citizens involved are tragic -- over 72,000 deaths in 2017 and 11.4 million Americans misusing prescription pain medicines according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

            It's a crisis fueled in part by doctors diverting pain killers to the black market, along with drug trafficking.  The drug companies play a major role with their high-pressure marketing and sales methods.  And even illegal immigration is implicated in the crisis, in that these immigrants are some of the traffickers bringing drugs across the borders.

            So what is to be done about the crisis?  In response, Brakke, publisher of American Leadership Books, has come up with a series of suggestions, outlined in a white paper "Dealing with the Opioid Crisis" and a series of 6-10 minute videos based on it that describe the scope of the opioid crisis and offer solutions.  It is a program that Brakke has been providing to politicians, educators, the media, and the Trump administration.

            After describing the high costs of drugs to victims and the economy and the responsible parties, Brakke offers a several dozen suggestions on what to do.  For example, some of his recommendations are:

            - Reduce the demand for the drugs by developing new non-addictive pain relievers.

            - Make doctors and health providers aware of how their overprescribing contributes to the problem -- and more closely monitor the doctors' prescriptions and getting them to resist the marketing efforts of the drug manufacturers.

            - Provide medically assisted treatments to addicts before they overdose, such as putting them into programs with methadone or buprenorphine.

            - Require the drug manufacturers to provide records of their drug production and sales of different types of drugs to an agency in the government that can monitor them.

            - Concentrate efforts and resources on addictive opioids rather than other drugs in the war on drugs.

            - Concentrate more efforts and resources on drug treatment to reduce demand, because it has been so difficult to reduce the supply of drugs into the country.

            - Provide mandatory minimum sentencing as a penalty for distributing certain opioids, with the sentence duration dictated by the amount of substance seized.

           - Provide more funds for research into better addiction treatments.

            In making these observations and recommendations for resolving the opioid crisis in America, Brakke has drawn on more than five years of research on the U.S. criminal justice system and divisions in America society, and he has written about the opioid issue in Dealng with Illegal Immigration and the Opioid Crisis and chapters in Crime in America and in Uncertain Justice.  He offers a unique conservative approach to crime, criminal justice, and American society, based on applying an economic business model.  The goal is to do what works most efficiently to reduce costs and create more productive citizens.  

          The videos for his program are available on the American Leadership Books' YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfHgXXiW3jgODnaypgcYZFw.  The whole program of videos, PowerPoints, and white papers will be available on the American Leadership Books' website in July.

          To learn more, you can get a copy of Crime in America, Uncertain Justice, or Dealing with Illegal Immigration and the Opioid Crisis. The books are available through Amazon, Kindle, and major bookstores.   Also, free copies are available for government officials and politicians who are seeking ways to reduce the divisions in American society www.crimeinamericathebook.com.  Review copies are also available for high school and college teachers who might want to use these books and presentation materials in their classes.  Members of the media can obtain information there, too. 

          For copies of the book, more information on American Leadership Books and Paul Brakke, and to set up interviews, please contact:

Jana Collins

Jones & O'Malley

Toluca Lake, California

jana@jonesomalley.com

(818) 762-8353