for Healthline

In 2017, Paul Reithlinghshoefer, a heroin user, was admitted to Adventist Behavioral Health Hospital in Rockville, Maryland.

He left the program a week early and told his mom he had gotten kicked out for smoking a cigarette (the hospital is a smoke and tobacco-free environment).

Less than a month after his expulsion, Paul died of a fentanyl overdose. The hospital hasn’t commented on the reason for Reithlinghshoefer’s expulsion, though they deny that it was for smoking a cigarette.

It’s made me ponder the question (and not for the first time, either): How do we decide, exactly, what is and isn’t permissible in rehab? Continued