This week we've been reporting on some promising treatments for two of the deadliest drugs in America, opioids and alcohol.

William Brangham is back now with a conversation with one of the nation's leading researchers who is studying America's addictions and how we can better address them.

My next guest is one of the researchers who helped establish that addiction is in fact a brain disorder,

that taking certain drugs over time can change how our brains actually work.

Dr. Nora Volkov is the head of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, which is part of the NIH,

and is one of the world's biggest funders of research into drug abuse and addiction.

Dr. Volkov, so good to have you on the program.

We have been reporting on a few of the medications that show effectiveness for treating opioids

and alcohol abuse disorders.

And I wonder that from your long research on this topic, what role do you

see medications playing and helping people address their addictions? In the case of opioid juice disorders,

they're being crucial and they've been lifesaving. And again, it's one of the drivers that is now

reducing the number of people that are dying.

So in the case of opioid addiction, we have very effective medications.

The problems are, number one, that only a small percentage of people that would benefit from them,

approximately 25%, will get prescribed this medication.

Second problem is they start taking them and that protects them from overdosing,

but at six months, 50% of them will stop taking their medications.

And we only have three.

Bubrenorphine, methadone, and naltrexone.

So we need a wider variety of medication, and we need alternatives so that people that don't

respond to one medication can have options that go beyond those three medications.

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