An AMA Viewpoints post by Patrice A. Harris, MD, chair-elect of the AMA Board of Trustees

A father of five in Charleston, W. Va., last month told President Obama at a public event that if it weren’t for the quick response of police and paramedics earlier this year, his daughter would have died from a drug overdose. She is now in recovery, and the president—and the rest of us in the East End Community Center that day—wished him and his daughter the best.

Recovering from addiction, however, is not like recovering from a broken bone. It is a chronic medical disease that demands our care and compassion—as physicians and as a nation. We know that more than 24,000 Americans die from a prescription opioid or heroin-related overdose every year. Last month in Charleston, the president…