Posted on 07/14/2017 5:31:02 AM PDT by from occupied ga
...
legal or not, using opioids is just plain stupid. Compared to an opioid user, a man who punches himself in the face looks smart.
That's why I roll my eyes and change the channel when hectored about this so-called epidemic. If you want to talk about an epidemic, talk about zika or bird flu. Opioid addiction comes from a decision, not a virus. No mosquito can infect you with opioid addiction, and you don't need antibacterial soap to avoid catching it. To speak of it as an epidemic and to speak of addicts as victims is to stack the rhetorical deck for the view that addictions and overdoses are diseases rather than choices.
And that brings us to Middletown, Ohio, ... A city councilman there ... has proposed that the city’s EMTs simply ignore 911 calls from any overdosing addict who has already received Narcan from the city twice before. Three strikes, says his proposal, and you’re out. The very suggestion has, of course, prompted a tsunami of hate mail from people with lots of tattoos.
...
And if my cold-hearted attitude means that more opioid users die, my answer is a big, fat so what? If they don’t want to die, they shouldn’t abuse opioids. If an addict doesn't care about his own life, why should I?
...
You who tell us we have a duty to rescue every user, you who say we should give him a government program and pay a regiment of social workers for his benefit, you are the same people who portray the addict’s drug use as something other than a conscious decision.
...
Save our EMTs for real victims of real diseases.
Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2017/07/opioid_schmopioid.html#ixzz4mo9Lmwsz Follow us: @AmericanThinker on Twitter | AmericanThinker on Facebook
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Why do you think pharmacies are starting to lock-up the laxatives?
A few decades ago there was a novel with a plotline like that. Iirc it was set during the Cold War, when the Soviets were working through Cuba and Nicaragua to flood the U.S. with drugs and bring America down by a pandemic of addiction.
So the book was more truth than fiction. The title was 'Monimbo.' It was written by the late conservative writer, Arnaud de Borchgrave.
Riiiiiiiiiight.
You got it wrong Hagatha, I am self employed, pay a lot of taxes.
Well, you need to pay more, because there are a lot of junkies out there overdosing over and over, and you think they deserve the tax dollars to revive them over and over. So quit being selfish and pay more. You CAN pay more, you know. Put your money where your mouth is.
Yes, one of them is a son of my close friend.........glad your life is so effing perfect.
No contradiction - when a homosexual 'bugchaser' chooses to expose himself to HIV, it's no less a disease for being a choice. (Whether we should spend taxpayer money on his health care is a separate question, which I answer in the negative.)
I was being rhetorical.
He had to find an inpatient medical rehab center in order to wean him off of the drugs over more than two weeks, costing him several thousand dollars out of pocket.
Something people who make these sorts of statements have never experienced is chronic, debilitating pain, and the fact that opioids are physically addicting, and just "quitting" can be very dangerous.
Mark
I also know 3 other veterans who became addicted to opioids due to the military or VA, due to service related injuries.
Mark
I am in the same boat but I flat out cannot afford to go to Pain Management. Now I am supposed to just hurt all the time. I utterly despise a government that sticks its nose into every aspect of my life.
Whatever problems I have, I won’t be asking anyone else to pay for me to indulge them over and over.
Why didn’t he just wean himself off the drugs and keep those several thousand dollars? I don’t understand.
I think the real question here is vast landscape. You could have a 25-year old who is addicted, and over a 20-year period....the ambulance is called on 200 occasions to save the guy. You can add up the cost and ask yourself...how much compassion do you have, and if it’s $4,000 for a ambulance ‘trick’...this all adds up.
In my book...once the EMT team assesses it’s an Opioid problem...the hospital team ought to access a database and note this is the 4th time for the guy, and then pack up to leave. Tell the cops to wait till he’s expired and then call the local coroner’s office to pick him up.
Yeah. Like that.
Sticking oneself with a dirty needle compounds the choice. OD or get Hep or HIV. People should be allowed to make choices then live with the results of their choices.
It was explained to me that a lot of people get their prescriptions for painkillers refilled at that time and they sell them to make money on the side.
These aren't necessarily people who need monthly prescriptions - they may have needed them at some time, but the doctors seem to have forgotten that they are for the TEMPORARY relief of pain, and will continue to write refills as long as the patient asks for it. The VA is notorious for this, and have probably been more responsible for spreading addiction than anybody.
The doctors who over-prescribe are responsible in large part for the problem, and it will continue until this process is checked.
When on multiple opioids, for a long period of time, I'm told that the physical dependency becomes life threatening. It's not like smoking, and I was told that while he was in the facility, he went into shock 4 times.
Mark
You need to pay more attention to how people are talking, and the way they claim that doctors are too cavalier in "handing out" opioid prescriptions. I also have chronic pain. between Crohns disease, severe arthritis, and degenerative disk disease, I live with pain every day. I don't remember the time I slept for more that 3 hours uninterrupted. But I don't take my prescription for Vicodin unless I absolutely have to.
The government has already made it harder for me to get opioids I often need to be able to move without crying. I can't get a prescription for more than 30 days at a time. There's no such thing as a refill. I need to go the the pain specialist's office, taking time off of work and paying $60 for the office visit, in order to take the signed prescription from the doctor to the pharmacy.
My biggest fear is that in the name of the people who are killing themselves on addictive pain killers, the government is going to make it incredibly difficult for the people who live with chronic pain the drugs they need to make life more bearable.
Mark
That has been happening for a long time. It goes in waves. The answer, of course, as the answer to Obamacare, is to get the government the hell out of medicine and insurance. The only proper portion for the government in these fields is the Constitutional requirement for the government to guarantee weights and measures. Barring that, well, you get what you get. The government is riding on everyone.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.