The heroin addict who inspired Barack Obama to act on drugs has died. Now he’s honouring her legacy

‘Your advocacy will make a difference’. President declares addiction to illegal substances like heroin should be treated with the same approach as tobacco consumption or traffic fatalities

President Barack Obama waves after speaking at the National Rx Drug Abuse and Heroin Summit on March 29, 2016 in Atlanta, Georgia (Getty Images)

A heroin addict whose powerful story inspired Barack Obama to push for drug policy reform has died at the age of 30.

Jessica Grubb died of an overdose after she was prescribed powerful opioid pain medication following unrelated surgery. As the Huffington Post reported, she was let down by a treatment system that continues to resist openness and evidence-based practices when it comes to getting addicts the help they need.

Hours after the news of her death emerged, the President spoke at a national summit on drug abuse and heroin in Atlanta – and declared that addiction should no longer be treated as a criminal problem.

Ms Grubb’s story came to Mr Obama’s attention when her parents spoke to him on her behalf at an event in West Virginia last October.

Her father David Grubb, like Mr Obama himself, was a state senator and community organiser, a lawyer and a father to multiple daughters.

Ms Grubb first overdosed on heroin, but was revived by paramedics, on 15 August last year. Now, four stints in rehab and a total of seven years battling addiction have finally taken their toll.

In a letter to David, published in the Huffington Post, Mr Obama told her father: “Your willingness to share your family’s story left a powerful impression on me, and has helped accelerate efforts to deal with this national epidemic of addiction.

“Please know you are in our thoughts and prayers, and that your advocacy will make a difference.”

Addressing the Rx summit on Tuesday, Mr Obama compared drug addiction to tobacco consumption and road traffic deaths, calling for a similar “public health approach”.

“If we take the same approach here we can make a difference,” he said.

Mr Obama said government policy had been shifting slowly since the start of his administration but “in your last year in office you just get a little loose”.

“For too long we have viewed the problem of drug abuse in our society through the lens of the criminal justice system,” he said.

“But what we have to recognise is in this global economy of ours, that the most important thing we can do is to reduce demand for drugs.

“And the only way to reduce demand is if we provide treatment and think about this as a public health problem and not just a criminal problem.”

Mr Obama said he recognised the “politics” of the issue were difficult, but the White House has committed more than $1 billion to a funding initiative to fight the epidemic.

Criticising the “enormous resources put into drug interdiction” and the “jails full of folks who can’t function when they get out”, the President said the cost “incentive” was clear for changing the way drug addiction is dealt with on a state level.

“Part of what has made it difficult to emphasise treatment over the criminal justice system has to do with the fact that the populations affected in the past were stereotypically identified as poor and minority.

“As a consequence, the thinking was it is often a character flaw in those individuals in those communities and it’s not a problem because they are just being locked up.

“One of thing that’s has changed in this opioid debate is the recognition that this affects everybody.”

Mr Obama heard from a year-long recovering addict on the panel in Atlanta named Crystal Oertle, who told of how she would use heroin in her bathroom while her children were out at school.

And he may have been thinking of Ms Grubb when he said: “I want to make sure that for all the other Crystals out there who are ready to make a change, they don’t have to wait three months, six months in order to be able to access treatment.”