As recovering addicts age, many struggle to get care for long-term health issues

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• John Yang:

  The graying of America is being reflected in the nation’s drug crisis. Even as overdose deaths drop, millions of aging former drug users are living with long term health challenges exacerbated by their previous substance use. Ali Rogin has our report.

• Ali Rogin:

  A generation of addicts who grew up during the 1960s and 70s is aging. And whether they have gotten clean or are continuing to use, many are living with compromised health. More than 2 million Americans over the age of 65 have substance use disorders. That’s more than a tenfold increase in a decade.

  And today many are seeking support from a health care system grappling with the unique needs of this population for the first time. We spoke with a number of people in recovery about the health challenges they have faced while getting older, which they say are related to their years of substance abuse.

• Shelly Dutch:

  Hi, my name is Shelley Dutch and I am 70 years old.

• Mick Heitke:

  I’m Mick Heitke. I’m 58 years old.

• Kim Hurd:

  My name is Kim Hurd. I am 62 years old.

• Jerry Schlesinger:

  My name is Jerry Schlesinger. I’m 72 years old.

• Mark Knox:

  My name is Mark Knox. I’ll be 62 years old this year.

• Mick Heitke:

  I do have liver issues from alcohol abuse.

• Jerry Schlesinger:

  I’ve got hepatitis C, which is probably direct use of my intravenous drug use.

• Shelly Dutch:

  I had issues with irregular heartbeats and arrhythmias, poor nutrition and, you know, fatigue and digestive issues. Headaches were all part of it. Nosebleeds.

• Kim Hurd:

  Because of my drug use, I went in, I had lost 40 pounds and was malnutrition and had neuropathy in my toes. And then that has gotten better.

• Mark Knox:

  Right now my eyes are getting blurry, all that, my ears, I have tinnitus, arthritis. And then from the intravenous use, my leg is still messed up.

• Jerry Schlesinger:

  Being a recovering addict, I don’t use any kind of opiates or benzos for pain. I use deal with ibuprofen and handle it.

• Kim Hurd:

  Just being an addict in general and what I’m aware of because I’m also a recovery coach, you know, there’s stigma.

• Jerry Schlesinger:

  They seem to have a whole different attitude with the addict than they do with the normal guy out there.

• Shelly Dutch:

  We’re not bad people trying to get good. We’re sick people trying to get well. And we as adults can go on and thrive and have beautiful lives if we take it seriously and make recovery from any kind of co-occurring disorders a real commitment in our lives.

• Ali Rogin:

  Julie Wernau is a reporter for The Wall Street Journal and she’s the author of a recent article entitled “A Generation of Drug Addiction Survivors Is Entering Old Age.” Julie, thank you so much for joining us. We heard just a second ago from, among others, Shelly Dutch, who repeated a 12 step maxim which is we’re not bad people trying to get good, we’re sick people trying to get better.

  And I wonder, is that a perception that the people you’ve talked to have encountered when they try to enter the health care system and get medical care for issues related to their advancing age?

• Julie Wernau, The Wall Street Journal:

  Yeah. The stigma attached to this generation of drug use survivors is particularly strong. They’ll be possibly going to the same hospital that they’ve been to 20 times before and often are sort of treated as if, you know, they’re people who can’t get better and are sort of just a drain on the system.

  So often what you’ll see is a lot of delayed care because folks just decide that they’re not going to show up anymore to doctor’s appointments or to the hospital. And when you get to be 72 years old and used serious illicit drugs for most of your life, those problems really build up.

• Ali Rogin:

  And so what kind of problems do people tend to have? Certainly every person is unique, but I wonder if there are any commonalities that you’ve come to understand in your reporting.

• Julie Wernau:

  Yeah, I mean, this is a group just by virtue of the fact that they exist, that are really survivors. One of the things that generally complicates their health is that a lot of folks, for instance, who you know, are using fentanyl on the street have been homeless for possibly an extended period of time or in prison. And often, you know, those situations have, you know, been a big wear on their health in general. You have the kinds of diseases that come about from intravenous drug use.

  So there are folks with hepatitis C who are now dealing with what’s happened to their livers. People have lost all their teeth. And then at the same time, you sort of lose years of your life to drug use. And so if you’re starting over in your 60s or your 70s, there’s a lot that you might have missed that the general population learned on the fly over the years.

• Ali Rogin:

  Is this healthcare system equipped to help these people in the ways that they need help?

• Julie Wernau:

  The healthcare system right now is overburdened as it is. We haven’t really recovered from the pandemic. And so Medicare, for instance, is really playing catch up in terms of being able to provide the same services that you would get on Medicaid for an older population that might just now be deciding to truly enter recovery from drug addiction.

• Ali Rogin:

  And because a lot of those people who are entering recovery now are dealing with a landscape that was very different from when a lot of these baby boomer era folks started using. Right?

• JJulie Wernau:

  That’s right. I mean, you know, when you talk to older folks who are still using or in recovery, they come from a completely different generation.

  And so it’s interesting because sometimes you see a generational gap where people who are both in recovery but in different generations aren’t speaking the same language about that recovery. And I’ve seen some of that play out as well.