How to Stop Heroin Deaths
PHILIP SEYMOUR HOFFMAN, who died of an apparent heroin overdose on Sunday, was just one of hundreds of New Yorkers who fall
victim to this drug each year. Heroin-related deathsincreased 84 percent from 2010 to 2012 in New York City and occur at a higher rate — 52 percent — than overdose deaths involving any other substance.
I am an emergency physician at NYU Langone Medical Center and Bellevue Hospital, but I rarely see victims die of heroin overdose because most fatalities occur before patients get to the hospital. Overdoses often take place over one to three hours. People just slowly stop breathing; often they are assumed to be sleeping deeply, or they are alone./.../
 The death of Phillip Seymour Hoffman has sparked some strong and seemingly contradictory responses. What these reactions show is that many people find it hard to think of addiction as being anything except either a choice or a loss of free will.
The fact that addiction could involve an active choice to take drugs but still be utterly irresistible seems difficult for most people to fathom.
Let's take some reactions from the media. Over at Time, David Sheff wrote that "it wasn’t Hoffman’s fault that he relapsed. It was the fault of a disease". On the other hand, at Deadspin, Tim Griersonwrote that the drug taking was "thoughtless and irresponsible, leaving behind three children and a partner"./.../
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