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Drug overdoses are soaring during the coronavirus pandemic

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Drug overdoses are soaring during the coronavirus pandemic

#81

Post by ansible »

mnm1 wrote: post #31

People are desperate. This is to be expected. Along with unemployment, loneliness, hopelessness, helplessness, stress, fear, and anxiety have all risen greatly. This is how people cope when they are not in control of their lives and especially when they don't see a path to regain that control. I would expect more of this. Drug overdoses were already a huge issue because of societal issues. Now, they will be even more…

> It's a nationwide disaster that people are simply not ready to deal with. Many people here have no idea what suffering is and therefore, they don't know how to suffer or how to get through such times. Suffering is externalized onto minorities and other unwanted people in society so that the well off don't have to deal with it. Now everyone's suffering and many simply can't cope with the suffering or with the additional suffering.

These are hard times, for all of us.

My background: grew up in the USA, with typical public school education. When I was a kid in school, we (briefly) covered times like the protests against the Vietnam War, the Civil Rights Movement, Women's Suffrage, and such. But it all seemed distant to me back then. I knew, at an academic level, that the people fighting for change had a hard time... but we (as a nation) got through it, and made things better (well, maybe not really, but that's another discussion).

We are living through history, right here, right now. I can now see it from the other side. I can see a little more clearly what those people in the history books were going through. I now don't have the benefit of reading in a book that it all worked out in the end (that women got the vote, that civil rights laws were passed, etc.).

It may seem like it will never get any better. That the struggle for a brighter, better future for everyone is futile. That hate and stupidity will drag down this country, and that we'll never recover.

Do we all have the courage to continue on? In the face of unfairness and injustice? What will the history books say about us 50 years from now?

Re: Drug overdoses are soaring during the coronavirus pandemic

#82

Post by pstrateman »

Tiktaalik wrote: post #57
pstrateman wrote: post #9

The same is happening in Canada, it's because addicts are able to get money from the government and they buy far more drugs than they're used to having. Edit: all the people downvoting me, why? not a single comment seriously, this isn't a theory, it's just the facts https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/cerb-pandemic-opioid-addict...

It's not this. After all to get CERB you need to show how you've been put out of work due to covid 19. How do you do this when you have no job or fixed address? How do you do this if you're a sex worker selling sex for survival and your occupation is illegal? A side effect of covid19 is that drugs have become more scarce and expensive due to the border shutdown. This may be having an impact.

That's the requirements for the program, but in practice anybody can get it.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/cerb-pandemic-opioid-addict...

Re: Drug overdoses are soaring during the coronavirus pandemic

#83

Post by nostromo »

maerF0x0 wrote: post #18

Back when this started I made the claim that the long term consequences of lock down would exceed the short term benefits . Depression, Drugs overdose, murder (despair), Suicide, extra sedentary issues leading to diabetese/CVD, loss of jobs/meaning et al. I havent seen anyone do the math of the uptick there to talk about the marginal benefit of lockdown or the fact that this, once again, is a form of biased benefit f…

WHO has predicted hundreds of millions of people will risk starvation this year due to the economic ramifications of lockdowns.

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/pandemic-could-mean-260-mi...

Re: Drug overdoses are soaring during the coronavirus pandemic

#84

Post by Nasrudith »

mrow84 wrote: post #7
drtillberg wrote: post #3

I'm cynical enough at this point to wonder whether the states will add these terrible losses to the COVID-19-related statistics to advocate for stricter and longer lock-downs.

What do you think motivates states to want stricter and longer lock-downs?

Wanting the damn virus to die out and accepting that getting it spreading again will cause a longer pandemic. They expect patience to be rewarded by it staying gone like countries who did it right and are opening up borders selectively.

Re: Drug overdoses are soaring during the coronavirus pandemic

#85

Post by Klinky »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #79
Klinky wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those aren't consequences of the lockdown they're consequences of a pandemic .

Of the two examples I gave you, I can agree on one. People afraid to go to the ER could be considered a consequence of the pandemic - the lockdown doesn't say "Don't go to the ER if you need to". But lockdown did say "Don't make unnecessary trips to anywhere, not even the grocery store." Many of us interpreted that as avoiding unnecessary trips to the doctor also, which is why I for one have not had an annual physica…

"Don't make unnecessary trips" isn't the same as "don't see your doctor for necessary medical intervention". Call your doctor, find out what they recommend, and/or use Teledoc.

Regardless, if there was no lockdown, and medical systems were overwhelmed, like in New York, would you have been able to see your doctor then? Would you have wanted to go to an overcrowded ER or Urgent Care and wait for hours surrounded by infected patients?

Re: Drug overdoses are soaring during the coronavirus pandemic

#86

Post by pstrateman »

Tiktaalik wrote: post #57
pstrateman wrote: post #9

The same is happening in Canada, it's because addicts are able to get money from the government and they buy far more drugs than they're used to having. Edit: all the people downvoting me, why? not a single comment seriously, this isn't a theory, it's just the facts https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/cerb-pandemic-opioid-addict...

It's not this. After all to get CERB you need to show how you've been put out of work due to covid 19. How do you do this when you have no job or fixed address? How do you do this if you're a sex worker selling sex for survival and your occupation is illegal? A side effect of covid19 is that drugs have become more scarce and expensive due to the border shutdown. This may be having an impact.

> A side effect of covid19 is that drugs have become more scarce and expensive due to the border shutdown. This may be having an impact.

Wait, less drugs, more overdoses... what?

Re: Drug overdoses are soaring during the coronavirus pandemic

#87

Post by ianleeclark »

maerF0x0 wrote: post #18

Back when this started I made the claim that the long term consequences of lock down would exceed the short term benefits . Depression, Drugs overdose, murder (despair), Suicide, extra sedentary issues leading to diabetese/CVD, loss of jobs/meaning et al. I havent seen anyone do the math of the uptick there to talk about the marginal benefit of lockdown or the fact that this, once again, is a form of biased benefit f…

> Back when this started I made the claim that the long term consequences of lock down would exceed the short term benefits .

And yet the USA will both have their cake and eat it too. You get both the full brunt of the virus alongside economic collapse.

Instead of discussing the very real results of a demand collapse and how to address that, we get borderline eugenics posts attempting to throw more meat back into the grinder. Its all so incredibly abstract, these lives you want to sacrifice at your local Applebee's. But, hey, you're just worried about the long-term results--you're the caring one here. Those of us who want lockdown, were the ones causing the harm. Not the lack of a safety net, not the collapse of consensus, not the completely incompetent response, and never the fact that the copper has been so thoroughly stripped from the global supply chains that you couldn't even get enough masks into the country with a several months headstart.

Re: Drug overdoses are soaring during the coronavirus pandemic

#88

Post by kukx »

ianleeclark wrote: post #66
kukx wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess some vocal voters may actually prefer free money, than going to a tedious work and politicians pander to them.

Crazy to think someone would prefer unemployment to being coughed on by a jet ski salesman while waiting tables at a cheesecake factory.

I am not sure, if it is agreement or disagreement with my observation. And while I assume some people may genuinely be scared of the infection... It is hard not to notice that while the lockdown started the beaches were flooded with people. And I will not blame someone flipping burgers for preferring free money to their job. Having a low paid, boring job I would definitively prefer the free money and the free time. And I would probably even actively support the status quo. But it is nonetheless in the long term very harmful to the society and to the economic perspectives of normal people. The free money will be paid for in the years to come and it will be a long lasting burden. Maybe there will be some technological revolution, a great advancement in productivity that will help us mitigate this cost. But if not, the future looks painful.

Re: Drug overdoses are soaring during the coronavirus pandemic

#89

Post by wmeredith »

lemonberry wrote: post #59
mnm1 wrote: post #31

People are desperate. This is to be expected. Along with unemployment, loneliness, hopelessness, helplessness, stress, fear, and anxiety have all risen greatly. This is how people cope when they are not in control of their lives and especially when they don't see a path to regain that control. I would expect more of this. Drug overdoses were already a huge issue because of societal issues. Now, they will be even more…

As a recovering alcoholic I'm incredibly grateful to have built a toolkit to stay sober. Getting sober is a nightmare in the best of times. People in AA – which I haven't attended regularly for a few years – talk about being a "grateful alchoholic". It bothered when I heard that. I just wanted to have some bourbon and not put myself and others at risk. But over time I realized that they're grateful because getting so…

What’s in your “stay sober toolkit” if you don’t mind sharing?
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