GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ) – A disturbing statistic is showing Wisconsin is just outside the national top-ten in addiction numbers.
Law enforcement officials are hoping to reverse a trend that has Wisconsin registering 11th nationally in opioid addiction.
It can go unnoticed, but often times it’s the family of an addict that’s hit the hardest.
“It’s not unusual for officers to go into a home and discover that there’s no food in the house or that the child hasn’t eaten that day,” says Green Bay Police Chief Andrew Smith.
He says children suffer when an addicted parent becomes solely consumed with their need to get high.
“That becomes the focal point of someone’s life, all they want to do is continue getting high using those drugs,” says Chief Smith.
The new focus to slow and hopefully stop this trend is to extend help into the home of an addict and to educate younger children about the pitfalls of drug addiction.
“In order to have an impact on the child, we have to embrace the family,” says Sue Vincent, the executive director at Encompass Early Education and Care. “What we do here is only as good as what happens when they go home.”
The not-for-profit organization recently created a family advocate position that will help attack addiction problems at home and work to protect families.
Chief Andrew Smith agrees that the fight on this front will be won by educating and developing good habits in our youth.
“The real answer is stopping that next generation of children from falling into that same trap that this generation has fallen into,” he says.
The Wisconsin opioid overdose death rate is more than twenty percent above the national average, according to the National Institute of Drug Abuse.
