I thought this was a great post, shining a light on something that needs to be discussed. I learned a lot about native americans abusing substances. I hope something will get done about this!

Hey Blen!
Thank you for sharing what you found in those articles. I think it’s very important to discuss this issue without shaming those who are addicted to substances. The best thing to focus on is how we can prevent addiction, and ways to help people recover. It wasn’t until recently when I learned that the Native American population has the highest rate of substance abuse than any other minority group. Thank you again for discussing a topic that needs to be brought up more .

Although this seems like an issue that has been going on for some time, is it possible that the higher rates of substance abuse could also be due in part not only in other conditions, but also these somewhat depressing times. Nonetheless I hope more can be done to help minimize the negative effects that come from substance abuse in these communities.

I had never known that the substance abuse was much higher for any ethnic group let alone that group be Native Americans. This is a really interesting topic to read about and the solutions you talk about really could go towards every person and kid.

I knew that minority communities have historically struggled with substance abuse, but I had never realized how bad it was in the native community. Do you know why that is? I am aware that Indigenous people in the U.S and Canada face unique issues such as the problems with reservations, environmentally and otherwise, as well as the missing native women. Do you think that this contributes to the problem?

This was really interesting to see. It might be worth while to research the influence of certain substances, especially hallucinogens, and their influence in various native cultures and spiritual practices/beliefs. It’s important to know what might be responsible for some of these issues with substance abuse and if the word “abuse” is even fairly assigned.