A new government report conducted as part of the National Climate Assessment concluded that the global climate is changing due to human activities. As a direct result of human activities, especially emissions of greenhouse gasses, the planet has experienced an unnatural warming trend over the last 150 years. The report directly contradicts President Trump on climate change raising fears the President would move to suppress it.

The Report’s Findings on Climate Change Directly Contradict the President’s Position on Global Warming

For over a decade, President Trump has publicly stated that he does not believe climate change is a result of human activity. He has repeatedly called climate change a “hoax” citing cold temperatures and heavy snowfall in the winter as evidence climate change was a fraud. He even went so far as to accuse the Chinese of creating climate change to damage the U.S. economy.

The Report Found Human Activities, Especially Emissions of Greenhouse Gases, Are Directly Responsible for Drastic Changes in the Climate

The report concludes there is abundant evidence that human activity is responsible for the observed changes in the climate.

In fact, the “human impact was responsible for an increase in global temperatures of 1.1 to 1.3 degrees Fahrenheit from 1951 to 2010.” Moreover, the United States has experienced a dramatic spike in average temperatures since 1980.

There is no evidence supporting an alternate explanation for climate change, “no natural cycles are found in the observational record that can explain the observed changes in climate.”

Government Report on Climate Leaked for Fear That Trump Would Suppress It was originally published in the bashful cashew on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

A new government report conducted as part of the National Climate Assessment concluded that the global climate is changing due to human activities. As a direct result of human activities, especially emissions of greenhouse gasses, the planet has experienced an unnatural warming trend over the last 150 years. The report directly contradicts President Trump on climate change raising fears the President would move to suppress it.

The Report’s Findings on Climate Change Directly Contradict the President’s Position on Global Warming

For over a decade, President Trump has publicly stated that he does not believe climate change is a result of human activity. He has repeatedly called climate change a “hoax” citing cold temperatures and heavy snowfall in the winter as evidence climate change was a fraud. He even went so far as to accuse the Chinese of creating climate change to damage the U.S. economy.

The Report Found Human Activities, Especially Emissions of Greenhouse Gases, Are Directly Responsible for Drastic Changes in the Climate

The report concludes there is abundant evidence that human activity is responsible for the observed changes in the climate.

In fact, the “human impact was responsible for an increase in global temperatures of 1.1 to 1.3 degrees Fahrenheit from 1951 to 2010.” Moreover, the United States has experienced a dramatic spike in average temperatures since 1980.

There is no evidence supporting an alternate explanation for climate change, “no natural cycles are found in the observational record that can explain the observed changes in climate.”

According to reporting by The Guardian, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) recently banned the use of climate change nomenclature in agency business. In lieu of climate change phraseology, the agency directed employees to use climate-neutral terms like “weather extremes.”

USDA has begun censoring use of the term 'climate change', emails reveal

President Trump is a Vocal Critic of Climate Change

President Trump wasn’t always such a fervent climate denier. In 2009, Trump and his children signed a letter to President Obama urgently calling for a global climate deal. In part, the letter read:

“If we fail to act now, it is scientifically irrefutable that there will be catastrophic and irreversible consequences for humanity and our planet.”

However, it wasn’t long before Trump began publicly criticizing climate change as a hoax. His favorite argument against climate change was the fact that it was really cold in winter.

In 2015, Trump appeared on Hugh Hewitt’s radio show said he wasn’t “a believer in man-made global warming.”

President Trump is Quietly Purging His Administration of Any Mention of Climate Change

Since taking office, President Trump has expunged references to climate change from federal government websites. He removed an entire section of the White House website that contained climate change content. A section on climate change on the Department of the Interior website was deleted. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) removed the climate change section of its official website.

Trump is deleting climate change, one site at a time

President Trump is reopening federal land to new coal mining leases reversing an Obama-era moratorium. Last year, the Obama Administration imposed a moratorium on new coal mining leases on public land to conduct a three-year study to evaluate the coal industry’s environmental impact. Trump’s Interior Secretary, Ryan Zinke, lifted the moratorium stating the study was a waste of money and that coal mining on federal land is good for the environment because it promotes energy independence. However, it is not clear if the decision to reinstate new coal mining leases will have any demonstrable effect on job growth.

Reversing Obama-Era Regulations Won’t Bring Jobs Back to Struggling Coal Industry

The coal mining industry has been in steady decline for the last thirty years. The long-term loss of coal mining jobs is a function of three primary factors:

• Increased automation in the coal mining.
• Abundance of cheap natural gas.
• Obama-era regulations making coal mining more costly.

Trump has repeatedly stated that deregulation alone is enough to restore the coal industry and restore “many thousands” of mining jobs. At a rally in Kentucky this year, Trump promised the audience that deregulation would restore the coal industry.

As we speak, we are preparing new executive actions to save our coal industry and to save our wonderful coal miners from continuing to be put out of work. The miners are coming back[.]

There is nothing the President can do stop automation or natural gas; consequently, deregulation alone will not save the coal industry.

A recent poll commissioned by The Economist reveals Republicans distrust the media and support silencing media outlets for publishing “fake news.”

In the poll, Republicans were asked whether they trusted the President more than the New York Times and the Washington Post. 70% sided with the President. Only 15% said they trusted the Times and the Post more.

Republicans also supported shutting down or fining media outlets for publishing fake news. The poll asked Republicans whether courts should “shut down news media outlets for publishing or broadcasting stories that are biased and inaccurate.” 45% of Republicans polled said the courts should be able to to shut down purveyors of fake news while more than half of Republicans polled supported fining a media outlet for publishing fake news. Moreover, 40% of Republicans opined that such fines would not violate the First Amendment.

Medication-Assisted Treatment (MAT) is a controversial approach to opioid addiction but is gaining support in the addiction medicine community. The current trend in addiction medicine favors the use of MATs in treating opioid addiction. The opioid epidemic in the United States has pushed opioid addiction treatment to the foreground of public health policy and with the numbers of overdose deaths on the rise, policy makers look to effective opioid treatment options.

Medication-Assisted Treatment a Controversial Concept

The addiction treatment community has traditionally been divided on the use of MATs in treating opioid addiction. Traditionalists, adherents to the 12-step model of recovery, insist that MATs replace one addiction for another. While proponents of MATs take a more pragmatic stance claiming that the use of MATs reduces the incidence of opioid related overdose death and increases success in treatment.

What is Medication-Assisted Treatment

Medication-Assisted Treatment (MAT) is “the use of medications, in combination with counseling and behavioral therapies, to provide a ‘whole-patient’ approach to the treatment of substance abuse disorders” (www.samhsa.gov). Methadone, buprenorphine, and naltrexone are used to treat opiate addiction by reducing cravings and blocking the euphoric effect of the abused drug.

Methadone has been used for decades to treat opioid addiction and works by tricking the brain into believing it is still getting opiates thereby preventing the addict from experiencing withdrawal. Methadone mitigates the painful symptoms of opiate withdrawal and blocks the euphoric effects of opiate drugs.

Buprenorphine operates much like methadone by suppressing and reducing opiate cravings. Often buprenorphine is combined with naloxone and sold under the brand name Suboxone. Naloxone blocks the effects of opioid medication that can lead to opioid abuse.

Naltrexone works differently than methadone and buprenorphine in that it blocks the euphoric and sedative effects of opiate drugs. Naltrexone is unique because instead of activating opioid receptors in the brain it binds and blocks those receptors reducing opiate cravings.

The Controversy over Medication-Assisted Treatment

Melinda Campopiano, medical officer at the Center for Substance Abuse Treatment at the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration argues that opiate addicts who undergo MAT reduce the risk of death from all cause in half. MATs are also an “essential component of an ongoing treatment plan” according to Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse. The American Society of Addiction Medicine has called for greater use of MATs as have many members of Congress.

However, not everyone is on board with MATs. Some lawmakers like Rep. Tim Murphy, R-Pa, see MAT as “government-sponsored addiction” that merely substitutes one form of drug dependence for another.

Narcotics Anonymous (NA) and its 12-step model is a program of complete abstinence and views MATs as drug substitution.

Expanding Access to MATs Is Necessary to Fight the Opioid Epidemic

In July of this year the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services published several new actions to address the country’s opioid epidemic including the rule to increase access to MAT providers nationwide.

The federal government supports the use of MATs in opioid treatment programs throughout the nation. The federal plan focuses on three priority areas: (1) increasing access to MAT, (2) improving prescribing practices, and (3) expanding the use of naloxone, a life-saving drug that can reverse the effects of overdose.

Despite the continued opposition of many in the addiction treatment community, MAT is here to stay as a fundamental element to opioid treatment. As federal policy continues to expand MAT, treatment providers, local courts, and health care providers will have little choice but to adopt MAT in their own practices.