The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, which is responsible for researching on data and trends on substance abuse on a nationwide scale, has found out that close to 39,500 people seek admissions in centers for drug and alcohol rehab in Missouri each year. According to the 2004 statistics, this figure was exactly 39,466. The population of Missouri back then was 5,752,861. Considering these two figures, it meant that for every 145 persons in the state, one person required addiction treatment in that particular year. This is certainly a very alarming situation; one that needs some urgent remedial measures.

However, the number mentioned above only includes those people who sought some kind of addiction treatment in Missouri. This was just a fraction of the total number of people who were really addicted within the state. A large number of Missourians are still in the state of denial. They do not want to believe that they have some problem within them that needs treatment. They are happy with themselves. There are speculations that the actual number of people needing treatment could be ten times the number of people who actually land in the rehab centers.

A breakup of these numbers was also obtained in terms of the specific addictions that people who went for these treatments had. About 19.5% of the people had sought treatment for alcohol addiction in Missouri. These were the people who were addicted just to alcohol and to no other substance. The number of people addicted to alcohol and a drug or more was much larger than that. Out of the various kinds of drugs used in Missouri, marijuana was the highest. 26.8% of the people who checked in for treatment were looking for marijuana addiction treatment. 16.9% wanted cocaine addiction treatment and 4% wanted heroin addiction treatment.

Popularity: 2% [?]