Raising Lazarus with Author Beth Macy

Myers Center Auditorium,Dallas NC 28034

22 September, 2022

Description

Gaston Together, Gaston Controlled Substances Coalition, and Olive Branch Ministry are honored to welcome author Beth Macy to Gaston College for an in-person conversation and book signing on her new book, Raising Lazarus: Hope, Justice, and the Future of America’s Overdose Crisis. This timely book delivers a “deeply reported, deeply moving” account of everyday heroes fighting on the front lines of the overdose crisis. This event is free and open to the public, with registration. Doors will open at 8:30 AM, and the event will begin at 9 AM. AgendaPre-Event Book Purchasing and SigningIntroductionPresentationQuestions and AnswersPost-Event Book Purchasing and SigningAbout the bookNearly a decade into the second wave of America's overdose crisis, pharmaceutical companies have yet to answer for the harm they created. As pending court battles against opioid makers, distributors, and retailers drag on, addiction rates have soared to record-breaking levels during the COVID pandemic, illustrating the critical need for leadership, urgency, and change. Meanwhile, there is scant consensus between law enforcement and medical leaders, nor an understanding of how to truly scale the programs, working at the ragged edge of capacity and actually saving lives. Distilling this massive, unprecedented national health crisis down to its character-driven emotional core as only she can, Beth Macy takes us into the country’s hardest hit places to witness the devastating personal costs that one-third of America's families are now being forced to shoulder. Here we meet the ordinary people fighting for the least of us with the fewest resources, from harm reductionists risking arrest to bring lifesaving care to the homeless and addicted to the activists and bereaved families pushing to hold Purdue and the Sackler family accountable. These heroes come from all walks of life; what they have in common is an up-close and personal understanding of addiction that refuses to stigmatize—and therefore abandon—people who use drugs, as big pharma execs and many politicians are all too ready to do. Like the treatment innovators she profiles, Beth Macy meets the opioid crisis where it is—not where we think it should be or wish it was. Bearing witness with clear eyes, intrepid curiosity, and unfailing empathy, she brings us the crucial next installment in the story of the defining disaster of our era, one that touches every single one of us, whether directly or indirectly. A complex story of public health, big pharma, dark money, politics, race, and class that is by turns harrowing and heartening, infuriating, and inspiring, Raising Lazarus is a must-read for all Americans. About the authorBeth Macy is a Virginia-based journalist, the author of Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company That Addicted America, and an executive producer and co-writer on Hulu’s Peabody Award-winning Dopesick series. Campus mapThis event will take place in the Myers Center. Click here to view a map of Gaston College's Dallas campus.