Trauma is a word many of us associate with the battlefield, or perhaps the athletic field – a wound, a shock, a blow--physical or mental. Now there’s growing understanding of how cities are affected by trauma – the people who live in some neighborhoods, and entire communities – and there’s more awareness of the awful toll trauma takes on health. Today the Urban Health Institute at Johns Hopkins has assembled dozens of experts to look at the impact of trauma on cities and on health. One of the speakers will be Baltimore’s Health Commissioner Leana Wen. She stopped by WYPR first to discuss trauma with us.

Maryland Lt. Gov. Boyd Rutherford held a summit Wednesday in Baltimore for the Maryland Heroin and Opioid Emergency Task Force.  Baltimore Health Commissioner Dr. Leana Wen said heroin has been a problem in the city for decades. "We have to focus on saving lives, first and foremost. Second, I want to make sure we see addiction as a chronic disease, which it is. It's just like high blood pressure or diabetes -- there are treatments available, but it is something that can be fatal," Wen said.

More Baltimore residents died as a result of drug overdose than homicide last year, a startling fact in light of how easy it is to prevent opioid overdoses. We know how to prevent deaths, and there are effective treatment options for addiction. The question is, how we get the necessary resources to those who need them most? This was the message at the first community update meeting of the Mayor’s Heroin Treatment and Prevention Taskforce.