Elevate Community Conversations is having a live event 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 9,  at the Sidney High School Performing Arts Center.

The featured speaker is from the Omaha Nebraska DEA, the U.S. Department of Justice Drug Enforcement Administration. The Nebraska DEA will be talking about drug trafficking, and Killer Drugs in Nebraska. 

This event is free to the public and the community is encouraged to attend as the discussion dives into the most current facts and statistics facing Nebraska and the Panhandle on Killer Drugs in Nebraska. Also joining the live event, the Western Nebraska Intelligence & Narcotic Group (WING), will be discussing drug trends in Nebraska.  Some facts about WING:

• The WING Task Force is one of several task forces in Nebraska. WING covers the 11 Panhandle counties (Banner, Box Butte, Cheyenne, Dawes, Deuel, Garden, Kimball, Morrill, Scotts Bluff, Sheridan, and Sioux). WING receives significant funding through federal grants administered by the Nebraska Crime Commission. WING also receives significant funding through the Midwest High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA).

• WING and HIDTA agents are drawn from the ranks of the Alliance Police Department, Chadron Police Department, Cheyenne County Sheriff's Office, Gering Police Department, Kimball Police Department, Nebraska State Patrol, Scottsbluff Police Department, Scotts Bluff County Sheriff's Office, and the Sidney Police Department.

• In addition to their duties of investigating cases involving drugs and violent crime, WING agents perform a variety of other functions. They testify in court whenever necessary. They conduct training for other officers throughout the region. They also provide drug awareness programs to civic and school organizations. Several of them serve on SWAT teams, and several of them are members of the Nebraska Region IV Clandestine Laboratory Team.

Plan to attend as officials dive into social media dangers of fentanyl, Nebraska trends in deadly drugs and investigations.

Is mental Health and substance abuse related?

One of the ongoing discussions is the relationship between mental health and the use of narcotics and illegal drugs. It is almost a question of what came first, substance abuse or mental illness.

According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness, about 50 percent of people with severe mental disorders are affected by some form of substance abuse or dependence. Additionally, 37 percent of people who are dependent on or abuse alcohol and 53 percent of people who are dependent on or abuse street drugs also have at least one serious mental illness. 

In psychiatryonline.org, Dr. Kathleen T. Brady and Sinha Rajita, Ph.D., said in their abstract on Co-Occurring Mental and Substance Use Disorders: The Neurobiological Effects of Chronic Stress, "The high rate of co-occurrence of substance use disorders and other psychiatric disorders is well established."

In their article, they say "one of the bridging constructs between psychiatric and substance use disorders is the role of stress in the development and relapse of substance use disorders and other psychiatric disorders."

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) from July 2014 speaks of the role of trauma and stress in mental illness and substance abuse. The article says trauma "is an almost universal experience of people with mental and substance use disorders."