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As Scotland's 'Trainspotting' Generation Ages, the Dead Pile Up

nytimes.com

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Re: As Scotland's 'Trainspotting' Generation Ages, the Dead Pile Up

#31

Post by wallace_f »

krageon wrote: post #24
otabdeveloper4 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was crystal-clear to me. Maybe your judgement is clouded because of bias?

The bias that the only country that has regular large-scale shootings also makes it easy for it's citizens to buy guns! And then there were a bunch of other facts not at all related to guns that have no bearing on it, culminating in an ill-advised moralising conclusion that it (it being a lot of deaths and what I have to assume is bad policy) is deserved because of all those things.

The point was intended to be general, that average people are not rational, nor even moral, using an exceptionally lopsided comparison where reason and human life stands on one side, and emotion and propaganda on the other. Emotion and propaganda wins, obviously.

Probably every generation in history looks back in time at every other generation and has no hesitation in coming to this conclusion. It is only with our current generation that our cognitive biases and emotional nature tell us to believe otherwise.

Re: As Scotland's 'Trainspotting' Generation Ages, the Dead Pile Up

#32

Post by Teever »

Does anyone know what is going on with Estonia in that first graph?

The first spike in deaths for Estonia seems to happen after the 2008 financial crisis, but I'm surprised to see that the dfinancial crisis hit Estonia harder than the US?

What other facts give Estonia a surprisingly high mortality rate from opiates?

Re: As Scotland's 'Trainspotting' Generation Ages, the Dead Pile Up

#33

Post by meheleventyone »

Theodores wrote: post #18
jdietrich wrote: post #3

Not mentioned in the article: The Scottish heroin epidemic started in Edinburgh, the more prosperous of Scotland's two largest cities. This was largely due to the presence of MacFarlan Smith, which was at one point the world's largest producer of pharmaceutical opiates. That initial cohort of heroin users in the 1980s predominantly used drugs that were diverted from the legitimate pharmaceutical supply rather than sm…

That is rare information. Never heard of MacFarlan Smith before. To add to the cocktail of drugs there is also glue sniffing. South of the border you will never see anyone sniffing glue and I doubt there are many people in England who wake up in the morning with a burning desire to sit in the street sniffing glue. But this goes on in Glasgow. I found this shocking to see. There is also 'Bucky' that alcohol that is no…

There is plenty of solvent abuse outside of Scotland including glue sniffing.

Re: As Scotland's 'Trainspotting' Generation Ages, the Dead Pile Up

#34

Post by pjc50 »

wallace_f wrote: post #6
_Understated_ wrote: post #4

My late brother used to talk about an area outside Glasgow called Springburn and how it is consistently listed as one of the poorest/deprived places in Europe (not sure if that was the correct term but it gets the point across). Yet each election term they voted in either the same politicians or politicians with the same manifestos. Nothing will change!

I think we deserve it. 70,000 yearly people die from Big Pharma's opioid crisis in the US, Jeff Bezos and his companies barely pay taxes and his newspapers run non-stop spam about how we should disarm the peasants because 20-100 per year die in mass shootings, and people actually agree with it. Face it, we're opiated masses of worthless idiots.

This thread is about Scotland, pal.

Re: As Scotland's 'Trainspotting' Generation Ages, the Dead Pile Up

#35

Post by hogFeast »

arethuza wrote: post #27
cstross wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A secondary issue is also policing culture. As a cost-saving measure due to Westminster-imposed spending cuts, the Scottish government merged all six regional Scottish police forces into a single force, Police Scotland, in 2013. This involved a game of musical chairs at senior rank as posts were merged, so the senior officers with the best resumes (most people working for them, biggest budgets) ended up getting the p…

The only time I've encountered someone who displayed open sectarian bigotry was a (distant) relative who happened to be in the Strathclyde police force! Mind you this was going back a bit (1980 or so) but someone who ranted about the evils of Catholicism to anyone in earshot probably didn't get many counter arguments from their colleagues.

Sectarian bigotry is still common. In fact, bigotry in general is still common. What has changed is the self-righteousness and the change in focus onto groups that "deserve it" (i.e. the English, Jews to name two of the most common...not including sectarian obv, as that is just so prevalent).

And I know someone who used to work as a diversity officer (they ran seminars on diversity) for the Police: bigotry runs very deep unf. The slightly bizarre twist recently is that the Police now spends a lot of time on hate crime (i.e. chasing easy arrests on Twitter)...poacher turn gamekeeper I suppose (and again, the self-righteousness is utterly incomprehensible).

Re: As Scotland's 'Trainspotting' Generation Ages, the Dead Pile Up

#36

Post by daedalus_f »

shellac wrote: post #23
matthewmacleod wrote: post #10

This is a particularly active political issue too – drug policy is at present a reserved matter of the UK government, which means the devolved government of Scotland is missing some important tools they could use to help deal with the issue. This something that the pro-independence Scottish government are making quite a bit of noise about now; some of it is probably opportunism, but Scotland's drug culture is differe…

The UK used to prescribe heroin for addicts, which I understand inspired the Swiss treatment of addicts. Rolling that back as part of the war on addiction seems to have been counterproductive in terms of overall health.

I don't think direct heroin-assisted treatment has been commonplace in the UK for a long time. You need an individual license from the Home Office for diamorphine prescription [1], whereas the opiate replacement drugs can be prescribed by any medical prescriber (though in practice this tends to be only done by specialists and some GPs).

[1] - https://www.gov.uk/guidance/controlled-drug-domestic-licence...

Re: As Scotland's 'Trainspotting' Generation Ages, the Dead Pile Up

#37

Post by lvoudour »

Teever wrote: post #32

Does anyone know what is going on with Estonia in that first graph? The first spike in deaths for Estonia seems to happen after the 2008 financial crisis, but I'm surprised to see that the dfinancial crisis hit Estonia harder than the US? What other facts give Estonia a surprisingly high mortality rate from opiates?

Apparently high numbers of fentanyl users (article from 2012 which more or less coincides with the big spike in the graph)

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-17524945

Re: As Scotland's 'Trainspotting' Generation Ages, the Dead Pile Up

#38

Post by ocschwar »

Teever wrote: post #32

Does anyone know what is going on with Estonia in that first graph? The first spike in deaths for Estonia seems to happen after the 2008 financial crisis, but I'm surprised to see that the dfinancial crisis hit Estonia harder than the US? What other facts give Estonia a surprisingly high mortality rate from opiates?

Easy access to opiates thanks to Russia.

Re: As Scotland's 'Trainspotting' Generation Ages, the Dead Pile Up

#39

Post by daedalus_f »

_Understated_ wrote: post #15
matthewmacleod wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, it's more complex than that. In a country that has for many years only had a broadly two-party system, there was little effect to be had by voting for someone else. And given Glasgow's historical politics, that was always going to be the lefty party. Things have changed, though. The devolved Scottish Parliament has now been in operation for 20 years; in Westminster, Glasgow North-East (which is the parliamentar…

My issue with drug policy revolves around two key points: 1. The war on drugs is an utter failure (by that I mean, it hasn't halted drug use but there are likely those in power who benefit from this) 2. None of their policies tackles root causes, e.g. putting ex-drug users back into their old habitats will likely guarantee they'll just do it again. I'm from Glasgow (Kirkintilloch), live in Ayrshire now, and I saw it…

While I don't think it’s a cure all, Portugal seems to have had significant improvements in drug related health problems (at least in the short term), crime and anti-social behavior after radical decriminalization in 2001. But sounding tough on drugs is too tempting for politicians, and most of the press screams at any sign of decriminalization.

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/dec/05/portugals-radic...

Re: As Scotland's 'Trainspotting' Generation Ages, the Dead Pile Up

#40

Post by CalRobert »

Theodores wrote: post #18
jdietrich wrote: post #3

Not mentioned in the article: The Scottish heroin epidemic started in Edinburgh, the more prosperous of Scotland's two largest cities. This was largely due to the presence of MacFarlan Smith, which was at one point the world's largest producer of pharmaceutical opiates. That initial cohort of heroin users in the 1980s predominantly used drugs that were diverted from the legitimate pharmaceutical supply rather than sm…

That is rare information. Never heard of MacFarlan Smith before. To add to the cocktail of drugs there is also glue sniffing. South of the border you will never see anyone sniffing glue and I doubt there are many people in England who wake up in the morning with a burning desire to sit in the street sniffing glue. But this goes on in Glasgow. I found this shocking to see. There is also 'Bucky' that alcohol that is no…

Ah, Buckfast is viewed with a bit of affection in Ireland (the Republic) as well. Though I've never seen anyone actually drink it.
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