Expert sounds alarm on new wave of US opioids crisis • Hacker News Board

Re: Expert sounds alarm on new wave of US opioids crisis

#101

Post by fifteen1506 » Sun, Jan 28, 2024, 3:22 PM UTC

lotsofpulp wrote: post #47

fifteen1506 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Do you have any evidence to show the blame lies somewhere in the middle? As far as I can tell, a retail pharmacy’s role is to dispense medication per a prescription, while avoiding errors caused by mixing medicines and advising people how to take medicine. A retail pharmacy’s role is not to be the de facto front line workers for the DEA. So when our government collects fines from businesses for not policing their cus…

Well yes, because OxyContin was oversold and the company's behaviour was unethical.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/29/health/purdue-opioids-oxy...

Re: Expert sounds alarm on new wave of US opioids crisis

#102

Post by meepmorp » Sun, Jan 28, 2024, 3:23 PM UTC

devilbunny wrote: post #85

Der_Einzige wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The harm to society of people who need them not getting pain drugs far outweighs the pain to society of those who don’t need them abusing them. I’ve had similar experiences with them not giving me proper painmeds are having all 4 of my wisdom teeth removed. They gave me 2 weeks of Tylenol #3 and some homeopathic bullshit and expected that to be good enough. Luckily my stepdad is a serious medical patient with lots of…

I don’t live in your skin, but I had all of my wisdom teeth extracted under local anesthetics without sedation. And I never even needed an NSAID. Maybe it hurt you that bad, but it’s not par for the course.

> I don’t live in your skin

You should have stopped there.

Re: Expert sounds alarm on new wave of US opioids crisis

#103

Post by nobodyandproud » Sun, Jan 28, 2024, 3:23 PM UTC

Loughla wrote: post #30

nobodyandproud wrote: post #10

I see this as analogous to the Dust Bowl, where the politicians and coastal elite ignored or dismissed the growing problem until it was too big to ignore. - https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/1000-mile-long-sto... - https://mallhistory.org/items/show/274 100 years and more information than ever, yet we have’t figured out this out-of-sight, out-of-mind problem.

Bingo. The center of this country (outside of a few major urban/sub-urban areas) is hollow. Between the loss of agriculture as a family job, loss of industrial jobs, and opioid use after decades of methamphetamine use, it's bleak. And no one really cares. As a general rule, we're told, "just move to Chicago (St. Louis, Kansas City, wherever)". That's not a solution, or a possibility for a lot of folks.

"just move to Chicago (St. Louis, Kansas City, wherever)"

When my wife and I drove to Kentucky--from NYC--for a road trip in the late 2000s, it was disappointing just how much more of the same we saw. Back then, it was strip malls. Walmarts.

A lot of the day-to-day Americana and culture we were hoping to see was simply fantasy or diluted, as most of the money--and therefore the culture--comes from large companies and interests.

Re: Expert sounds alarm on new wave of US opioids crisis

#104

Post by nobodyandproud » Sun, Jan 28, 2024, 3:24 PM UTC

gWPVhyxPHqvk wrote: post #98

nobodyandproud wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, every reason why we don't have universal healthcare comes down to voting in politicians that are against it, but what outsiders and party hardliners fail to appreciate is where the resistance comes. When the Democrats controlled the presidency and both houses, we failed to push out any reasonable form of universal healthcare and that is due to several specific interests that have a hold on the Democrat party the…

It’s wild that you blame Democrats for the failure to pass universal health care.

It's wild that you don't understand why Democrat squabbling was what contributed to the failure.

Re: Expert sounds alarm on new wave of US opioids crisis

#105

Post by somenameforme » Sun, Jan 28, 2024, 3:25 PM UTC

nsagent wrote: post #75

diamondap wrote: post #44

A few years ago, I talked to three retired federal law enforcement agents who had each spent 20+ years fighting the cartels that were bringing drugs into the US from Mexico and South America. All three felt betrayed by the US government. They said, essentially, "We put our lives on the line many times to try to stop the flow of drugs. Then the government turned around and basically gave the pharmaceuticals license to…

My mom worked as an ER physician in Pennington Gap, VA during the early years of opioid abuse there (late nineties through through the early oughts) [1]. She would constantly complain about drug seekers there and refused to give out pain meds. According to her, she was the only doctor who would refuse to give out pain meds. Fast forward to 2022, she needed heart surgery and was in the ICU for three weeks afterward. S…

If she never explained what was happening there, public ERs cannot refuse service to anybody for any reason. So drug addicts will use ERs as an attempt to score drugs by pretending to have some illness or another. If they fail, they'll just go to another one. And then repeat the circle. Even when the people at the ER know they're faking and they're there solely to try to get drugs, they have to continue trying to treat them in good faith. It's a major source of burn-out for ER workers, because it's just never-ending and a complete waste of resources.

Re: Expert sounds alarm on new wave of US opioids crisis

#106

Post by subpixel » Sun, Jan 28, 2024, 3:27 PM UTC

In the USA if your problem can’t be solved in a way that produces a profit, you must solve it yourself or live with the consequences.

Our society is too heterogenous for us to make public benefit a goal. Every type of benefit is perceived as a zero-sum game.

Add in the fact that Americans tend to vote against their self-interest(1) in order to conform to the ideology with which they identify, and it’s turtles all the way down.

(1)This is more easily recognized when viewing the behavior of some other group, but it’s identifiable among all groups.

Re: Expert sounds alarm on new wave of US opioids crisis

#107

Post by _fat_santa » Sun, Jan 28, 2024, 3:29 PM UTC

nsagent wrote: post #75

diamondap wrote: post #44

A few years ago, I talked to three retired federal law enforcement agents who had each spent 20+ years fighting the cartels that were bringing drugs into the US from Mexico and South America. All three felt betrayed by the US government. They said, essentially, "We put our lives on the line many times to try to stop the flow of drugs. Then the government turned around and basically gave the pharmaceuticals license to…

My mom worked as an ER physician in Pennington Gap, VA during the early years of opioid abuse there (late nineties through through the early oughts) [1]. She would constantly complain about drug seekers there and refused to give out pain meds. According to her, she was the only doctor who would refuse to give out pain meds. Fast forward to 2022, she needed heart surgery and was in the ICU for three weeks afterward. S…

I remember going to the dentist a number of times a few years back and they always prescribed me something crazy like percs, vicodin, oxy, etc. I never actually got any of the scripts filled because by then I had read too may stories about the opioid crisis and was determined to never venture down that road. I did notice once the opioid crisis really hit the mainstream press, my dentist stopped prescribing those strong painkillers and prescribed prescription grade tylenol or ibuprofen instead. Never filled those prescriptions either because the prescription grade stuff was the same as taking more of the regular OTC medicine.

Re: Expert sounds alarm on new wave of US opioids crisis

#108

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Jan 28, 2024, 3:32 PM UTC

dns_snek wrote: post #59

op00to wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just a point - the same people who thought they were “saving” people with a drug war were destroying lives themselves over drugs that not so many years later are legal and accepted to possess. Somehow they’re not harmful anymore. It’s all BS.

Excellent point, and it's not just a thing of the past, it's still happening right now. Cannabis might be at various stages of legalization throughout the US, but there are countless other substances that are criminalized without any justification, like psychedelics. The damage that the US-led war on drugs has done throughout the world is staggering. It's probably going to take decades until all the brainwashing and…

[deleted]

Re: Expert sounds alarm on new wave of US opioids crisis

#109

Post by jb1991 » Sun, Jan 28, 2024, 3:36 PM UTC

chasil wrote: post #77

jb1991 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Believe it or not, this concept of having strong pain killers available to the public is somewhat American-centric. Much of Europe does not consider the need for strong pain killers available in society, and pain tolerance is quite different in, for example Germany or the Netherlands, where it has been nearly impossible to get anything strong for pain for many decades.

I've actually been offered fentanyl for medical procedures that involved moderate discomfort several times. I refused it and endured the pain. The physicians had never seen anyone do that before.

It's different for surgery, in a hospital, if that's what you are referring to. But for take-home use, it's nearly non-existent in much of Europe.

Re: Expert sounds alarm on new wave of US opioids crisis

#110

Post by ofslidingfeet » Sun, Jan 28, 2024, 3:37 PM UTC

diamondap wrote: post #44

A few years ago, I talked to three retired federal law enforcement agents who had each spent 20+ years fighting the cartels that were bringing drugs into the US from Mexico and South America. All three felt betrayed by the US government. They said, essentially, "We put our lives on the line many times to try to stop the flow of drugs. Then the government turned around and basically gave the pharmaceuticals license to…

And funny enough, here I was just thinking about how these jerks are making it so that, after the midwit backlash against all the criminal behavior encouraged by the Biden admin, I'll get to just live in pain the next time I have an injury!