Can Research Lighten the Massive Economic Burden of Addiction?

A report released last Thursday by the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse found that smoking, alcohol abuse, and illegal drugs cost federal, state, and local governments $467.7 billion in 2005. Reporter Erik Echolm described the stunning numbers in The New York Times. Federal expenditures alone amount to $238.2 billion, or 9.6 percent of the federal budget, but only about 2 percent of the total spending accounted for prevention, treatment, and addiction research, he wrote. A breakdown of each federal and state dollar spent on substance abuse and addiction in 2005, outlined in CASA’s report, explains what exactly is so costly:

• 95.6 cents of each dollar paid for the social burdens of substance abuse and addiction, including the cost of prisons, health programs, schools, government payrolls, and child welfare, juvenile justice and mental health systems
• 1.9 cents funded prevention and treatment programs
• 1.4 cents covered the costs of collecting alcohol and tobacco taxes, regulating alcohol and tobacco products, and operating liquor stores
• 0.7 cents paid for federal drug prohibition
• 0.4 cents funded addiction-related research

When the government is dishing out a minimum of $1,486 per capita to cover the results of our failure to prevent and treat abuse and addiction, additional research on the problem might be worthy of additional investment, the report argues.

“For every dollar federal and state governments spent to prevent and treat substance abuse and addiction, they spent $59.83 in public programs shoveling up its wreckage, despite a substantial and growing body of scientific evidence confirming the efficacy of science-based interventions and treatment and their cost-saving potential,” says the CASA report.

However, the amount of tobacco research may soon increase. The bipartisan “Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act” would give the Secretary of Health and Human Services the ability to request additional research findings from tobacco manufacturers or importers on the effects of tobacco products or on the potential to reduce the health risks of tobacco products with available technology. S.982 is in committee while the Senate will vote on cloture of the motion to proceed on H.R. 1256 today.

Image: flickr.com/SuperFantastic

Tags: public health

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