Posted on 04/27/2014 4:45:59 PM PDT by mgist
HP: Many people don’t realize that overdose is the leading cause of accidental death in the U.S. I gave a talk about five years ago in Chicago, and I mentioned that we had more overdose deaths than traffic fatalities. My audience literally did not believe me. People were absolutely convinced that I had mis-transcribed the numbers. Every year, America loses a little over 32,000 people in auto crashes, and something like 38,000 from overdose deaths annually.
KH: Yeah, it’s remarkable if you compare overdoses to AIDS, which at its peak was taking about the same number of lives. The difference in reaction is really startling. We appropriately became galvanized about HIV/AIDS, and implemented much better public policy to prevent HIV-related deaths. It’s much harder to get traction on the overdose issue, or even to get people to believe how prevalent the problem actually is.
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HP: Just to note the numbers, in 1999 there were about 4,000 prescription opiate overdoses. In 2010, there were about 16,000. By comparison, there are about 10,000 gun homicides in the United States.
KH: It is pretty amazing. Many people are focusing on the return of heroin and saying, “It’s all the fault of criminals.” You’ve got to remember, 4 in 5 of people today who start using heroin began their opioid addiction on prescription opioids. The responsibility doesn’t start today with the stereotypical criminal street dealer. We basically created this problem with legally manufactured drugs that were legally prescribed. This really flies in the face of the argument that if we just had a flow of legal drugs, the harms would be minimal.
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HP: Can I ask you an embarrassingly basic question? If someone like Philip Seymour Hoffman presumably had access to all sorts of prescription opioids, why does he end up injecting heroin?
KH: That’s actually a good question. Cost drives many people to heroin. It’s more expensive to buy oxycodone than it is to buy heroin. Presumably that was a less pressing concern for Mr. Hoffman. Perhaps the intensity of the rush of injected heroin was more reinforcing to him than opioid medications were. The prescription medications have a longer, slower cycle of action in the body. His heroin use could also be the result of habit. He had experienced a heroin problem before, many years ago. It could be that that was the drug that he knew best or was available in the networks of dealers he used. I’m speculating about somebody I don’t know, but those are some possible reasons.
For most people it’s cost. Add one other thing; when people lose their health insurance, they may need the opioids to manage their pain. People sometimes end up buying street drugs including heroin to manage their pain because they have lost the insurance that used to cover their pain.
Yes, I too have had family members that chose to experiment, with varying degrees of consequence.
But here's the thing. It's not 1920. We KNOW it is dangerous. Children are warned again and again and again and again. If they decide to do it anyway, well.... this is just not behavior that I know how to empathize with. I am a big fan of learning from other people's mistakes. I really don't understand people who have to check for themselves to see if heroin is really dangerous. I mean, come on, really? Really?? You couldn't find something else to do? I'm sorry, but... I can't sympathize.
You are nobody to judge the victims of this government complicit epidemic.
I have friends who are married, both doctors, with children. Their children are on Adderral as is the wife (doctor).
They recommend these drugs constantly.
If it weren’t for the fact that my nephew was given these drugs as a child, and diagnosed with an addiction disorder at 18, the weight loss side effect would be very enticing to me too.
There but for the grace of God go you.
We have an epidemic, a plague, and this affects everyone. Only the truth will set us free.
Legendary pianist Bill Evans, classically trained and basically the "inventor" of the kind of smooth, classy, cool "cocktail" jazz you'd hear at an elegant high-end party, was a heroin addict who died of all the complications of heroin addiction, though not an overdose. He was an amazing musician, and one friend who knew him said it was "the world's longest suicide."
Addiction is about 90 percent a moral issue, and about 10 percent a medical one.
Two people helping this happen are your friends, yet it is the people on this board (who are merely pointing out the inevitability of the consequences) which you lash out against.
Perhaps you might direct your ire to the two parties where it might properly do some good.
It is, and will always be, an issue of supply and demand. The Federal governments job is to protect citizens. Instead banks, Soros, are laundering Billions $, and rest assured that money is greasing a lot of palms. May God help us.
This government has done endless research and knows addiction is an issue of supply, which affects demand. https://www.ncjrs.gov/ondcppubs/publications/policy/99ndcs/iv-g.html
http://www.channel4.com/news/venezuela-most-dangerous-place-earth-murder-monica-spear-colombia-drugs
Everyone one of us will reach a point in our lives when we are in pain, when we are curious, or when we are with negative influences. Young minds will always be vulnerable, and if there is a vast supply of opiates in pill or inhalant format, it is likely anyone will try.
That is what is going on today. The evil one always seeks death and slavery and our loved ones are all at risk.
With the full support of government-run education system and child-focused programs that buy 100 percent in diagnosing personal behaviors that are perfectly humanly normal and old as time, into psychological ISSyews such as short attention spans and bursts of energy and anger and aggression, requiring chemical "treatment" in teens, teen agers, hormones raging, normal kids ... rowdy, God-blessed normal American boys and girls ...
... instead of giving them a world where they can work all that out by getting a job to earn money and enjoy life and get in trouble and learn from their mistakes and generally pursue happiness, government, between minimum wage and centralized education, has nourished a system that "protects" American kids into idle self-absorbed twitterhood and drugs the ones that resist for having ADD. SICK SICK SICK. Drugging children! Government has nourished it in official capacity; remove government ... and that will at least weaken the problem and make kids healthier.
Government involved in medicine is amoral disaster ensured.
People volunteer to become addicts. All of us who kicked an addiction are an indictment on those who didn’t. It’s not easy but it’s something you want to do.
People don’t die from addiction. They die from choices. I know adrenaline junkies who are dead from their choices.
Im giving you one example of educated people making poor decisions. Most people listen to their doctors. Is that a bad moral decision? NO is it a lack of vigilance? Yes.
Since big brother is sheltering us from truth, you really can’t blame the victims.
We have to inform people. That is my only point. Stay away from prescription drugs, beware doctors, and make your children aware that terrorists are out to get them via drugs.
If your children are in public schools be extra careful. Pray for your kids everyday parents. Lift them up to God, because there is a war that is beyond most people’s comprehension.
“Our whole nation is being flooded with heroin,” said District Attorney David Heckler.
http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/local&id=9455706
It takes a pillage.
Agreed! But more like money is the root of all evil. It is ALL about the benjamins.
You and I think alike. The problem isn`t the vast quantities available. There could be a million dollars worth of heroin free and I wouldn`t touch_much less try_it. The problem is weak/stupid people. I don`t think many are chased down and given heroin/coke/meth against their will. They choose it. Many poisons are available to people daily and they are not taken. Addicts can`t deal with life. They seek constant escape . Everyone KNOWS how deadly drugs are in this day and age. To choose to start the is-IMO-a subconscious death wish. The addict is the problem. No customers...no product.
Yep. Stupid times ten. The only one stupider is vegan.
What the hell is government doing in the mix? Are we people incapable of understanding nutrition otherwise? But it's for the children!
Exactly. I might try it one day if it’s legalized and I’m 80 and already dying of liver cancer. Otherwise, no. I mean, geez.
Yes.
So what if a junkie overdose, why the hell should sick people have to suffer for that.
The problem is that that "junkie" probably is a guy who is in chronic physical pain but his doc cut him off or never prescribed because of regulations. Being in pain makes you a little nuts and that can lead you to getting your relief from a dealer because you can not from the doctor. But the stuff you get from the dealer might not be pure or it might be too pure.
Result death.
Good point.
In a bigger picture than addiction, even the street drugs are I think related to an addiction culture, is prescribing psychotropic drugs for *flame retardant suit* ADD and behavioral stuff with the blessings of Authority and government. Pain killer are one thing. It's a hard difficult moral issue, not a medical one. But American "medicine" sets up an intrinsic acceptance of the whole concept, the "normal" of being on prescription drugs even in your early teens. That's the thing that bothers me most.
My condolences, for your loss. My son lost two good friends, by overdose, he was ‘lucky’ to have been arrested, for pill possession, now in his fourth year of sobriety. I can’t fathom how deep a tragedy it must be, for you.
thank you
going to drug addiction treatment programs for 3 years was a real eye opener
kids addicted to drugs are not bums, they are heartbreakingly beautiful kids from nice families, and they made a bad choice and it cost them, who aming us never made a bad choice? I just believe some of us are lucky or were chosen for some reason to go on and not pay the ultimate price for making bad choices, and others were and did and it cost them forever, but it also cost the world. What, we will never know
They knew it was dangerous then! They've always known it would be the pit to hell for some people. Drug addiction is a moral issue, YOU ARE CORRECT.
The medical and education establishments, hewn solely by government, become puffed and dangerous when addiction is classified as a medical or legal "issue."
Regardless,it is a moral issue and always will be.
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