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Safe injection sites in San Francisco could be first in the US

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Re: Safe injection sites in San Francisco could be first in the US

#81

Post by sharemywin »

fhayde wrote: post #76
meri_dian wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Education will not stop people from getting caught in the death grip of heroin. Just as education does not stop people from smoking cigarettes today. And once an addict is born, as they say, that person will struggle with addiction for the rest of their lives even if they manage to abstain. I'm all for legalization of marijuana, but legalization of heroin is a very poor idea. Heroin must be kept out of the hands of t…

Legalize everything, and offer the appropriate counter-medication at a discounted cost. Heroine costs someone $20 per use? Methadone is $10. You'll never keep drugs out of the hands of people who want them, all you're doing is creating artificial scarcity driving up prices and giving people like Mexican drug cartels huge financial incentives to run drugs into the country. Even if only 1/10th of their drugs make it in…

So, turn the Mexican drug cartels over to america drug cartels? Until we fix the cartel problem in the US legalization will do nothing but bring down prices. Look at how it took 30-50 years for "education" in tobacco products. Yes there are examples of countries that have legalized drugs, but without a much better healthcare system in the US it would turn into a huge money grab.

Re: Safe injection sites in San Francisco could be first in the US

#82

Post by Retric »

fiblye wrote: post #71
Xylakant wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The death grip of heroin is mostly unrelated to the actual medical properties of heroin (or most opioids). The worst health effects come from the impurities in the substance (Strychnine, a common additive, is generally speaking not a substance beneficial to your health), the conditions under which it's used (shared needles, lack of hygiene) and the treadmill of having to organize funds for the next shot. Medically sp…

Heroin wasn't historically a problem because the users died. Heroin's been a problem because of just how far people will go to get it, and how a massive amount of people will drop everything else in life just to get a steady supply of it. Opiates are the most addictive substances in the world. Once someone gets a taste of it, their life is forever changed. People can smoke a cigarette a couple times and decide it's n…

I knows several people that tried Heroin a few times and gave it up, but where addicted to cigarettes. Different people have different drug preferences ans I doubt we have good statistics on this stuff.

I like many people where given opioids post surgery and ended up tossing the pills vs finishing the prescription, yet people get really addicted to the same medication.

Re: Safe injection sites in San Francisco could be first in the US

#83

Post by leereeves »

fiblye wrote: post #71
Xylakant wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The death grip of heroin is mostly unrelated to the actual medical properties of heroin (or most opioids). The worst health effects come from the impurities in the substance (Strychnine, a common additive, is generally speaking not a substance beneficial to your health), the conditions under which it's used (shared needles, lack of hygiene) and the treadmill of having to organize funds for the next shot. Medically sp…

Heroin wasn't historically a problem because the users died. Heroin's been a problem because of just how far people will go to get it, and how a massive amount of people will drop everything else in life just to get a steady supply of it. Opiates are the most addictive substances in the world. Once someone gets a taste of it, their life is forever changed. People can smoke a cigarette a couple times and decide it's n…

> There aren't many people who try heroin a couple times then realize they're busy and drop it forever.

Millions of people have used legal opioid painkillers and moved on with their lives. Some people get addicted but for the legal opioids it's far from true that "once someone gets a taste of it, their life is forever changed."

Is heroin that much more addictive than the legal variants?

Re: Safe injection sites in San Francisco could be first in the US

#84

Post by CaptainZapp »

blauditore wrote: post #39
tcj_phx wrote: post #13

In days gone by, heroin addicts knew how much heroin they needed to 'stay well'. A major factor in the escalation of deaths in the modern era is the contamination of the street pharmacy's heroin supply with more potent synthetic opioids (fentanyl, etc). Overdoses happen when street drugs are more potent than the user expects, or when the user's tolerance has changed. Two factors in my girlfriend's OD were having been…

> Until the politicians find courage to acknowledge that it was a mistake to trust organized crime to control the supply of addictive substances, [...] What would be a better solution in your opinion? Legalizing it, or allowing it with prescription? I see some problems with those alternatives as well; there's probably no magic bullet here.

How about supplying heroin under strict conditions and medical supervision?

Switzerland went this route 20 years ago and I dare say it's pretty successful.

The cost to health insurance (yep, they pay for it) is pretty much negligable. Especially when compared to the cost to the addicts and society to keep that shit completely underground.

Re: Safe injection sites in San Francisco could be first in the US

#85

Post by tmp-20150107 »

Retric wrote: post #82
fiblye wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heroin wasn't historically a problem because the users died. Heroin's been a problem because of just how far people will go to get it, and how a massive amount of people will drop everything else in life just to get a steady supply of it. Opiates are the most addictive substances in the world. Once someone gets a taste of it, their life is forever changed. People can smoke a cigarette a couple times and decide it's n…

I knows several people that tried Heroin a few times and gave it up, but where addicted to cigarettes. Different people have different drug preferences ans I doubt we have good statistics on this stuff. I like many people where given opioids post surgery and ended up tossing the pills vs finishing the prescription, yet people get really addicted to the same medication.

Indeed, it's entirely possible for people to take heroin at the weekends or similar, and put it down without problems, and I know several friends who do it irregularly without getting addicted - although only smoking, I've never heard of anyone injecting IV heroin who wasn't an addict...

Re: Safe injection sites in San Francisco could be first in the US

#86

Post by crankylinuxuser »

fiblye wrote: post #71
Xylakant wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The death grip of heroin is mostly unrelated to the actual medical properties of heroin (or most opioids). The worst health effects come from the impurities in the substance (Strychnine, a common additive, is generally speaking not a substance beneficial to your health), the conditions under which it's used (shared needles, lack of hygiene) and the treadmill of having to organize funds for the next shot. Medically sp…

Heroin wasn't historically a problem because the users died. Heroin's been a problem because of just how far people will go to get it, and how a massive amount of people will drop everything else in life just to get a steady supply of it. Opiates are the most addictive substances in the world. Once someone gets a taste of it, their life is forever changed. People can smoke a cigarette a couple times and decide it's n…

Oh please. Enough of your DARE rhetoric.

I've been on hydromorphone. It's 8x more potent than morphine on a gram basis. Heroin is only 3x more powerful than morphine. I was on hydromorphone for 4 months, and then went DOWN to oxycodone for another 6 months. After 6 months, went on hydrocodone. By all measurements of addition, I was 100% addicted.

Yeah, it felt good having the drugs. But I also quit taking them sooner because I felt my mind fogging up. I didn't like that, and took more pain to be able to think clearly. But no, your assertions that people will just drop everything to get it is blatantly false.

Homeless people will go after heroin, if they can afford it. But those that choose this route are trying to numb the fact that people don't care about their condition, and that they have very little chance to raise themselves up. It's a social reason - if I cant have a better life, I can check out with drugs.

Re: Safe injection sites in San Francisco could be first in the US

#87

Post by tmp-20150107 »

meri_dian wrote: post #64
Xylakant wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The death grip of heroin is mostly unrelated to the actual medical properties of heroin (or most opioids). The worst health effects come from the impurities in the substance (Strychnine, a common additive, is generally speaking not a substance beneficial to your health), the conditions under which it's used (shared needles, lack of hygiene) and the treadmill of having to organize funds for the next shot. Medically sp…

I understand what you are saying. I agree that heroin by itself is not very harmful to the body relative to some other drugs. But let me be more clear about what I mean by "death grip". When someone cares so much about a drug that it becomes the focal point of their lives, where they become so utterly ruled by the object of their addiction that friends and family and all else not the drug become secondary fixtures in…

The point of medical heroin, or other harm reduction programs, is to allow people to get on with their actual life without the all consuming addiction being front and centre all the time. I'm currently on a methadone program in the UK (there aren't any heroin based programmes as far as I know here) and it lets me keep up my job as a software engineer without daily worries about having to make sure I can score and not be 'sick' (i.e. withdrawing) and unable to work or go to the office. A heroin prescription would accomplish the same thing for me, and for people in a worse situation - perhaps unemployed or homeless - it would mean even more, since they could devote their energy to rebuilding their life.

Personally, I don't really need a safe injecting space - I own my own home and have a pretty stable lifestyle, but again, I can see how for other addicts it would be incredibly helpful. Again and again, as seen in other comments, it can be seen how despite objections these places provide an objective positive benefit to society.

Re: Safe injection sites in San Francisco could be first in the US

#88

Post by tmp-20150107 »

fhayde wrote: post #76
meri_dian wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Education will not stop people from getting caught in the death grip of heroin. Just as education does not stop people from smoking cigarettes today. And once an addict is born, as they say, that person will struggle with addiction for the rest of their lives even if they manage to abstain. I'm all for legalization of marijuana, but legalization of heroin is a very poor idea. Heroin must be kept out of the hands of t…

Legalize everything, and offer the appropriate counter-medication at a discounted cost. Heroine costs someone $20 per use? Methadone is $10. You'll never keep drugs out of the hands of people who want them, all you're doing is creating artificial scarcity driving up prices and giving people like Mexican drug cartels huge financial incentives to run drugs into the country. Even if only 1/10th of their drugs make it in…

Heh, heroin does cost about that much, same for methadone, at least in the UK. I can get 100ml of 1mg/ml methadone for GBP 10 which will keep me stable for a day or two; a GBP 10 (i.e. 'tenner bag' or 0.2g) of heroin is enough for a single IV shot for many users. Of course, depending on your tolerance, that may well not be enough, but my point is that 'legal' heroin would probably be much cheaper than current 'street' prices. I'm not sure how cannabis prices have varied in places where it's legal in the US, though - do taxes bring the price back to parity with the old 'street' level? I'm guessing it's going to be complicated by the fact that it's still illegal in other states?

Re: Safe injection sites in San Francisco could be first in the US

#89

Post by meri_dian »

arca_vorago wrote: post #78
meri_dian wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't accept the slippery slope argument. But, let's entertain your line of thinking. Let's get rid of the speed limit everywhere. We don't need the stinking government telling us how fast to drive! Oh, looks like traffic deaths are going up. Hm, maybe we should institute a speed limit... The point is that people do need to be told what to do - with an enforced penalty - in certain situations.

Roads are a public place, subject to constitutional reasonable regulation (by the states, not the federal government) as long as not in violation of our right to travel. So you picked a bad example. Case in point, if I own a vehicle that never leaves my ranch property it doesn't need license plates, insurance, or a drivers license to operate it, and I can go as fast as I damn well please. What I do in the privacy of…

If you think being told that people can't go above a certain speed on the highway to make highways safe enough to drive on makes you a "slave", I would tell you that you're being melodramatic.

Civilization is a set of rules, either informal or formal, that we obey. We do this so we can live peaceful and comfortable lives. If you think that's slavery then I feel bad for you.

Re: Safe injection sites in San Francisco could be first in the US

#90

Post by meri_dian »

tmp-20150107 wrote: post #87
meri_dian wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand what you are saying. I agree that heroin by itself is not very harmful to the body relative to some other drugs. But let me be more clear about what I mean by "death grip". When someone cares so much about a drug that it becomes the focal point of their lives, where they become so utterly ruled by the object of their addiction that friends and family and all else not the drug become secondary fixtures in…

The point of medical heroin, or other harm reduction programs, is to allow people to get on with their actual life without the all consuming addiction being front and centre all the time. I'm currently on a methadone program in the UK (there aren't any heroin based programmes as far as I know here) and it lets me keep up my job as a software engineer without daily worries about having to make sure I can score and not…

I'm curious to hear about your program. Is the goal to get you clean? Slowly wean you off heroin?
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