Civil commitment for opioid misuse: do short-term benefits outweigh long-term harms?

In response to a sharp rise in opioid-involved overdose deaths in the USA, states have deployed increasingly aggressive strategies to limit the loss of life, including civil commitment—the forcible detention of individuals whose opioid use presents a clear and convincing danger to themselves or othe...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inJournal of medical ethics Vol. 48; no. 9; pp. 608 - 610
Main Authors Messinger, John C, Ikeda, Daniel J, Sarpatwari, Ameet
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published London BMJ Publishing Group Ltd and Institute of Medical Ethics 01.09.2022
BMJ Publishing Group LTD
Subjects
COVID-19
Drug addiction
Drug overdose
Drug use
Drug withdrawal
involuntary civil commitment
Medical ethics
Mortality
Narcotics
Original research
Preventive detention
public policy
Substance abuse treatment
substance abusers/users of controlled substances
United States > US
Massachusetts
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Summary:In response to a sharp rise in opioid-involved overdose deaths in the USA, states have deployed increasingly aggressive strategies to limit the loss of life, including civil commitment—the forcible detention of individuals whose opioid use presents a clear and convincing danger to themselves or others. While civil commitment often succeeds in providing short-term protection from overdose, emerging evidence suggests that it may be associated with long-term harms, including heightened risk of severe withdrawal, relapse and opioid-involved mortality. To better assess and mitigate these harms, states should collect more robust data on long-term health outcomes, decriminalise proceedings and stays, provide access to medications for opioid use disorder and strengthen post-release coordination of community-based treatment.
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-1
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
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ISSN:0306-6800
1473-4257
DOI:10.1136/medethics-2020-107160