On February 2, 2014, Hoffman was found dead by his friend, playwright and screenwriter David Bar Katz, in the bathroom of the actor’s West Village, Manhattan office apartment.
According to the New York City Police Department, his death was the result of an apparent drug overdose. Investigators found in the apartment a large quantity of heroin and a number of prescription medications.
In a 2006 interview, Hoffman revealed that he had suffered from drug and alcohol abuse after graduating from college, and went to rehab for drug and alcohol addiction, recovering at age 22. He said he had abused “anything I could get my hands on. I liked it all.” Hoffman relapsed over 20 years later, checking into a rehabilitation program for about 10 days in May 2013 for help dealing with addictions to prescription pills and heroin
The death of actor Philip Seymour Hoffman on Sunday from an apparent heroin overdose is highlighting the growing use of heroin in America.
Doctors say heroin use has been on the rise in the past decade. Dr. Alla Borik, an addiction specialist at Lincoln Hospital, where Hoffman died, says the rise in heroin use is partially because of the rise in popularity of prescription painkillers like Oxycontin and Vicodin.
