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60 journalists all spend one week covering Cincinnati's battle with heroin

cincinnati.com

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Re: 60 journalists all spend one week covering Cincinnati's battle with heroin

#31

Post by djmankiewicz »

mschuster91 wrote: post #6

Shocking to read. But what really shocks me is the amount of arrests mentioned for possession of heroin or syringes. When will the US (and the rest of the world) finally learn that locking users up just perpetuates the problem - you won't get a job with a criminal record, same for housing. All this arresting does is fill the coffers of (private) jails and creates needless suffering. Also, why do people keep calling t…

> When will the US (and the rest of the world) finally learn that locking users up just perpetuates the problem...

I couldn't agree more with you on this point, but the point in this article when a sentenced addict chose jail instead of treatment nearly made my jaw drop. A lot of these people are simply hopeless.

> “You’re not going to change me,” he says.

To your point of state-provided heroin, I hope that more conclusive data comes out about safe injection sites soon. People are antsy about them getting installed in Seattle but I feel like it's simply time to try something.

Re: 60 journalists all spend one week covering Cincinnati's battle with heroin

#32

Post by kolbe »

pjc50 wrote: post #24
kolbe wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know everyone pictures the kid with a broken arm getting it set when they hear about socializing medicine, but all I picture is the US paying large corporations to make more people OD on opioids.

I'm sure the US could mess it up that badly, but it doesn't have to be that way.

Really? Take a look at everything else the federal government does and tell me it could possibly end up being anything better.

Re: 60 journalists all spend one week covering Cincinnati's battle with heroin

#33

Post by gregmac »

joe_the_user wrote: post #8
baldfat wrote: post #4

Let's not forget who to blame for this. Pharmaceutical companies and Doctors. West Virgina is the most effected - http://www.pulitzer.org/winners/eric-eyre These articles shouldn't make you sad but MAD. "In six years, drug wholesalers showered the state with 780 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills, while 1,728 West Virginians fatally overdosed on those two painkillers" That's 433 pills for every man, woman and ch…

Perhaps you could include poverty and despair (and trace back from there to a collapsing education system, ideological pathology...). It's hard not to see the opioid crisis as anything but an "ensemble effort" of everything that's falling apart in America - punctuated by the refusal of pundits and politicians to acknowledge these problems or move towards solving them. Edit: you could even say the willingness of drug…

> Perhaps you could include poverty and despair (and trace back from there to a collapsing education system, ideological pathology...).

It's really not about that -- although that certainly contributes to some drug use.

"The opioid epidemic began in the 1990s, when doctors became increasingly aware of the burdens of chronic pain. Pharmaceutical companies saw an opportunity, and pushed doctors — with misleading marketing about the safety and efficacy of the drugs — to prescribe opioids to treat all sorts of pain. Doctors, many exhausted by dealing with difficult-to-treat pain patients, complied — in some states, writing enough prescriptions to fill a bottle of pills for each resident."

This is not about people in poverty turning to drugs -- this is about people in pain going to the doctor, and being prescribed an addictive, dangerous substance as treatment.

"Over the past couple of decades, the health care system, bolstered by pharmaceutical companies, flooded the US with painkillers. Then illicit drug traffickers followed suit, inundating the country with heroin and other illegally produced opioids that people could use once they ran out of painkillers or wanted something stronger.

"The other opioids arguably pose even bigger risks than painkillers. Heroin is generally more potent, so it’s more addictive and more likely to cause overdose. And fentanyl is even more potent than heroin, and it’s also often laced into illicitly sold heroin without a user’s knowledge — increasing the odds he’ll take a much bigger dose than he can handle.

"The result is that as opioid painkiller deaths leveled off over the past few years, heroin and fentanyl deaths have rapidly increased."

https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2017/8/3/16079772/opi...

Re: 60 journalists all spend one week covering Cincinnati's battle with heroin

#34

Post by blfr »

baldfat wrote: post #4

Let's not forget who to blame for this. Pharmaceutical companies and Doctors. West Virgina is the most effected - http://www.pulitzer.org/winners/eric-eyre These articles shouldn't make you sad but MAD. "In six years, drug wholesalers showered the state with 780 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills, while 1,728 West Virginians fatally overdosed on those two painkillers" That's 433 pills for every man, woman and ch…

Let's not forget who to blame for this. Pharmaceutical companies and Doctors.

It's almost certainly not true. This massive susceptibility to addiction is a larger social problem of alienation, lack of community and purpose, not getting a couple of pills from your doctor.

Prohibition worked to some extent and would work tried again but it does not address the root problem.

Re: 60 journalists all spend one week covering Cincinnati's battle with heroin

#35

Post by pjc50 »

kolbe wrote: post #32
pjc50 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure the US could mess it up that badly, but it doesn't have to be that way.

Really? Take a look at everything else the federal government does and tell me it could possibly end up being anything better.

Sure, but that's the choice of people electing anti-government wreckers and crass opportunists, like that guy charging his security detail to stay in his own hotels. It's also the country that went to the moon. Your choice.

Re: 60 journalists all spend one week covering Cincinnati's battle with heroin

#37

Post by free_everybody »

seldin87 wrote: post #14

ibogaine. saved my life. it's sad more people don't know about this miracle. even sadder that government has chosen to outlaw the best available treatment for addiction that exists. please, if you or someone in your family suffers from drug addiction, especially heroin, please investigate ibogaine. seriously, just google it.

The fact that ibogaine, a drug with little if any neurotoxicity, is a Schedule 1 drug in the U.S. while millions of opioid pills get handed out every year to hopelessly addicted poor people makes me very, VERY upset. Does your government care if you live or die?

Re: 60 journalists all spend one week covering Cincinnati's battle with heroin

#38

Post by nxsynonym »

blfr wrote: post #34
baldfat wrote: post #4

Let's not forget who to blame for this. Pharmaceutical companies and Doctors. West Virgina is the most effected - http://www.pulitzer.org/winners/eric-eyre These articles shouldn't make you sad but MAD. "In six years, drug wholesalers showered the state with 780 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills, while 1,728 West Virginians fatally overdosed on those two painkillers" That's 433 pills for every man, woman and ch…

Let's not forget who to blame for this. Pharmaceutical companies and Doctors. It's almost certainly not true. This massive susceptibility to addiction is a larger social problem of alienation, lack of community and purpose, not getting a couple of pills from your doctor. Prohibition worked to some extent and would work tried again but it does not address the root problem.

>>not getting a couple of pills from your doctor.

You're gonna have to back that claim up. All the evidence points to the claim that over-prescribing is a real epidemic.

You're not wrong that there are larger social problems, but your argument essential boils down to "drugs addicts are drug addicts". The root problem is not being born a heroin addict, or not having a purpose in life, or not having a strong community. It's over prescribed pain medication pushed onto people for profits sake.

"Sales of prescription opioids in the U.S. nearly quadrupled from 1999 to 2014,1 but there has not been an overall change in the amount of pain Americans report.2,3 During this time period, prescription opioid overdose deaths increased similarly." https://www.cdc.gov/drugoverdose/data/prescribing.html

Re: 60 journalists all spend one week covering Cincinnati's battle with heroin

#39

Post by 123e1daAdfafsdf »

blfr wrote: post #34
baldfat wrote: post #4

Let's not forget who to blame for this. Pharmaceutical companies and Doctors. West Virgina is the most effected - http://www.pulitzer.org/winners/eric-eyre These articles shouldn't make you sad but MAD. "In six years, drug wholesalers showered the state with 780 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills, while 1,728 West Virginians fatally overdosed on those two painkillers" That's 433 pills for every man, woman and ch…

Let's not forget who to blame for this. Pharmaceutical companies and Doctors. It's almost certainly not true. This massive susceptibility to addiction is a larger social problem of alienation, lack of community and purpose, not getting a couple of pills from your doctor. Prohibition worked to some extent and would work tried again but it does not address the root problem.

It almost certainly is true. Doctors in the US overprescribe opioids like you wouldn't believe. They do this as a result of Purdue Pharma's super expensive marketing campaign designed to stamp out "opiphobia" -- a term they used for doctors unwilling to write out opiate scripts.

As a side benefit, they re-engineered the "slow release" version of the tablet. Except it didn't release evenly over 12 hours, like it said. Instead, it led to withdrawals towards the end of the period, which taught a user's brain the ups and downs of withdrawal -> high -> withdrawal. IE, it conditioned them to become addicted.

Re: 60 journalists all spend one week covering Cincinnati's battle with heroin

#40

Post by snarf21 »

blfr wrote: post #34
baldfat wrote: post #4

Let's not forget who to blame for this. Pharmaceutical companies and Doctors. West Virgina is the most effected - http://www.pulitzer.org/winners/eric-eyre These articles shouldn't make you sad but MAD. "In six years, drug wholesalers showered the state with 780 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills, while 1,728 West Virginians fatally overdosed on those two painkillers" That's 433 pills for every man, woman and ch…

Let's not forget who to blame for this. Pharmaceutical companies and Doctors. It's almost certainly not true. This massive susceptibility to addiction is a larger social problem of alienation, lack of community and purpose, not getting a couple of pills from your doctor. Prohibition worked to some extent and would work tried again but it does not address the root problem.

Not attacking you but do you think cigarette companies are liable for smoking addiction?

My biggest problem with Pharma on this is that Oxy is 100x (?) more likely to get someone addicted than Tylenol 3 with Codeine or maybe even Morphine. I think part of selling Oxy should be a mandatory tax that goes to pay for opioid addiction.

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