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“Brian has been dead for 136 days,” says his mother, Vicki Bishop. “I watched him die over many years, and it was a long, slow, horrible death.” Her son’s decades-long battle with opioids blotted out the sun in her own life, says Bishop, 65, of Clarksburg, Md. It held her in the clenched fist of shock and anticipation shared by millions of American parents who are traumatized by a child’s substance use. “I spent so many years in stages of anxiety and depression,” Bishop says. “I worried about Brian 24/7. His disease took over my life.” (Fleming, 6/30)

Licensed professional counselor Pat Aussem works with the nonprofit Partnership for Drug-Free Kids to offer guidance to families navigating substance-use disorders. Here are some suggestions she offers parents. (Fleming, 6/30)

Violence is growing in American emergency rooms, fed by patient anger over their inability to get painkillers and rising health care bills, as well as the proliferation of gangs and untreated mental illness. ... Emergency rooms are a door into the underside of American life, and their growing violence speaks to the nation’s unresolved health care ills — from people in the grip of addiction to opioids and powerful new substances like artificial marijuana, to the growing financial burdens on patients for their medical care. (Allen, Colliver and Goldberg, 7/2)

Isolated, easily accessible and free from surveillance cameras and security guards, public restrooms have long been a place for illicit activities. And with a relentless opioid epidemic ravaging the nation, they have become a laboratory of sorts for drug users searching for a private space to get high. It presents a problem for business owners concerned not only about the safety of their customers but also of their employees — the ones cleaning up blood splatter, picking up used needles or calling 911 when a user has overdosed in the washroom. It has forced retailers to search for solutions such as placing cameras outside the facilities, securing the doors with lock pads or removing drop ceilings, where users often hide drug paraphernalia. (Bever, 6/29)

Minneapolis on Friday sued a group of opioid manufacturers and distributors, joining a long list of governments in Minnesota and across the country that have recently taken legal action against the companies. The city’s lawsuit takes aim at more than a dozen firms, arguing their actions to promote prescription opioid drugs, such as OxyContin, have caused an addiction crisis straining the city’s resources. The suit comes several months after county attorneys from across Minnesota, including Hennepin County, announced their intentions to sue the firms. (Roper, 6/29)