{"id":540,"date":"2018-11-22T17:29:15","date_gmt":"2018-11-22T17:29:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/madhuanand1111.com\/?p=540"},"modified":"2018-12-04T16:45:38","modified_gmt":"2018-12-04T16:45:38","slug":"vivamus-placerat-mauris-ut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/madhuanand1111.com\/en\/vivamus-placerat-mauris-ut\/","title":{"rendered":"Searching for a Cure"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A recovering opioid addict puts his faith in toad venom.<\/h2><\/div><\/div>\n\t
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The United States is in the throes of an addiction.<\/p>\n

According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse,\u00a0overdose deaths topped 72,000 in 2017, with 49,000-plus of those caused by opioids. In October that same year, President Trump declared the opioid crisis a public health emergency. He\u2019s extended that state of emergency two times\u2014in January and April 2018\u2014but so far it hasn\u2019t gone much beyond that: bravado rhetoric with little action.<\/p>\n

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In July 2018,\u00a0US senator Elizabeth Warren wrote an open letter to his administration, bluntly criticizing his attempts to address the issue and insisting they\u2019ve fallen short again and again. Since then, few tangible measures have been initiated to try to curb access, and it remains to be seen, too, how effective these will be. In the meantime, the users\u2019 thirst for the drug\u2014and struggle to get off it\u2014is something that continues.<\/p>\n

Neal Catlett, a 38-year-old recovering opioid addict from Lexington, Kentucky, has some less traditional ideas to offer: Could there be a drug to \u201cspiritually awaken\u201d those who suffer? Could the venom from a toad be the antidote to help America kick its dependency?<\/p>\n

I first met Catlett at the end of August 2016 while I was covering a protest march commemorating \u201cOverdose Awareness Day\u201d in New York, and he invited me to tag along to a \u201cceremony\u201d he would be attending later that day in the West Village. The ceremony involved smoking\u00a0the psychedelic venom from the Sonoran Desert toad\u2014which, similar to ayahuasca, is said to help people kick their long-term drug dependency.<\/p>\n

Curiosity, naturally, took hold of me. We met his \u201csitter,\u201d a man who travels around the world to administer the venom. This wasn\u2019t Catlett\u2019s first time, and he credits the toxin with contributing to his healing\u2014so much so that he plans to create clinics where others can test out the hallucinogens that saved his life.<\/p>\n

Over the span of seven months,\u00a0I visited Catlett in Lexington and photographed his daily life, as he searches for salvation and tries to help other addicts and those who are just curious about the spiritual journey.<\/p>\n\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>

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The back of a truck owned by one of Catlett\u2019s friends, who tagged along to a healing ceremony that involves smoking the venom of Bufo alvarius, containing hallucinogens that are believed to help kick long-term drug dependency.<\/h2>\n\t
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The metal tools above this man\u2019s eyes are purported to \u201calign the chakras,\u201d the focal points used in meditation.<\/h2>\n\t
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Catlett heads to a Clark County, Kentucky, Agency for Substance Abuse Policy (CC-ASAP) board meeting to promote his ideas for new ways to combat heroin addiction in the area.<\/h2>\n\t
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Madhu Anand, a shaman and sitter who was once a cocaine addict himself, prepares for a healing ceremony.<\/h2>\n\t
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Adrian Hooper participates in a healing ceremony with Anand.<\/h2>\n\t
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Surrounded by friends, Mallorie Branch, who lost her brother to opioid addiction, participates in a healing ceremony.<\/h2>\n\t
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Catlett smokes bufo. The toad that produces this substance is found in the Sonoran Desert.<\/h2>\n\t
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A printed prayer, which will be read before a healing ceremony.<\/h2><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, overdose deaths topped 72,000 in 2017, with 49,000-plus of those caused by opioids. In October that same year, President Trump declared the opioid crisis a public health emergency. He\u2019s extended that state of emergency two times\u2014in January and April 2018\u2014but so far it hasn\u2019t gone much beyond that: bravado rhetoric with little action.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":548,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nota-informativa"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/madhuanand1111.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/madhuanand1111.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/madhuanand1111.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madhuanand1111.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madhuanand1111.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=540"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/madhuanand1111.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":573,"href":"https:\/\/madhuanand1111.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540\/revisions\/573"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madhuanand1111.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/548"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/madhuanand1111.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madhuanand1111.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madhuanand1111.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}