While opioid addiction is widely recognized as a national epidemic, one aspect of the crisis has received little attention: the short- and long-term effects on children and adolescents whose parents are addicted. An individual’s substance use disorder (SUD) sends ripples through families and communities and ignoring these ripples can cause long-lasting consequences. Children affected by familial SUD are at increased risk of similar problems themselves, and kinship caregivers who often step in to care for these children are also likely to have increased physical and mental health needs.

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