Vivek Murthy Quotes

Any movement at all that reduces disease, that reduces overdoses, that reduces property crime, that reduces violent crime, is good.

When I was Surgeon General, I spent a lot of time talking to people in living rooms and town halls all across the country, and one of the things I started to notice was that behind many of the stories of addiction, violence, depression and anxiety were threads of loneliness.

People think it must be wonderful being in movies or on television, but it can be very tough on a child. I had two friends in elementary school. That was it. There was a clique of girls that were brutal to me. They pulled some very mean stuff. My two friends got me through it. Without them, I would have been all alone.

A lot of people think that addiction is a choice. A lot of people think it's a matter of will. That has not been my experience. I don't find it to have anything to do with strength.

The British state already invests in early intervention campaigns in drug abuse and sexual health. Challenging extremism should be no less of a priority.

Part of my job at 'The Economist' was writing about HIV, and that included the grim task of reporting on the state of the global epidemic.

Never once, during any of my bouts of depression, had I been inclined or able to pick up a telephone and ask a friend for help. It wasn't in me.

People who are lonely and depressed are three to 10 times more likely to get sick and die prematurely than those who have a strong sense of love and community. I don't know any other single factor that affects our health - for better and for worse - to such a strong degree.

My peers, lately, have found companionship through means of intoxication - it makes them sociable. I, however, cannot force myself to use drugs to cheat on my loneliness - it is all that I have - and when the drugs and alcohol dissipate, will be all that my peers have as well.

One major challenge within happiness is loneliness. The more I've learned about happiness, the more I've come to believe that loneliness is a terrible, common, and important obstacle to consider.

I've had more people in my life take their lives than... I think it's out of proportion with most people. I think a lot of them gravitate towards me because of the music.

Drug education is the only vaccine we have against the danger of drug abuse of our children.

Everybody's got so much of their own to deal with. They have no one to turn to.

When I moved to Atlanta, I felt like an outsider - away from my friends and family except for the LGBTQ community.

I don't need friends.

We have all learned that addiction and mental illnesses are illnesses, and I think a lot of people overlook that it is a chemical imbalance; it's like cancer, a sickness, and people need to see it as that.

If there's an addiction in the Clinton family, it's to problem solving.

The criminal justice system is not the right place - or it shouldn't be the place of first resort to provide addiction or mental health services. It should happen elsewhere with no police and no judges and no juries and no jails.

Everybody tells you over and over again that addiction is a disease. But when I read Nic's book I understood not just that this is a disease, but what the disease means.

When suicide hit my family, we learned first-hand that no one is immune from what is now the 10th leading cause of death in the US.

Too many people are suffering from severe behavioral health and substance use issues on our streets, which puts a strain on our hospitals and our criminal justice system instead of treating the root cause.

We grew up in an era where there was a lot of fear of HIV. Everybody worried about it and everybody took precautions, and everybody knew that it was a thing that was out there. As it slowed down, it left the spotlight, people forgot.

Those who have to struggle with addiction in their lives know the 'you only live once' mentality doesn't really work because you can only do that for so often before you're self-destructive.

That's the number one rule after you lose someone is go to somebody else, go to the people around you, be with the people that you love.

Advocating for quality addiction treatment has become a passion, and it's the most rewarding thing that someone like me can do. People were there to help me when I needed it, so I've made it my goal to pay it forward.