New Canadian Medical Association head calls for debate on decriminalizing opioids

[S.J.B.]

New Canadian Medical Association head calls for debate on decriminalizing opioids
CBC
September 21st, 2018

The new president of the Canadian Medical Association is calling on politicians to have an "open and courageous" debate about decriminalizing opioids in the face of a nationwide overdose crisis.

"I think the time for having those conversations is now," Dr. Gigi Osler told the CBC's Chris Hall in an interview airing Saturday on CBC Radio's The House.

"With the opioid crisis at the stage it is now, it's probably worth it to have that open and courageous conversation, to look at whether decriminalization would be part of the solution or would it contribute to the problem."

Osler said she uses the word "courageous" to describe such a debate because Canadian society's prevailing attitudes toward substance abuse -- particularly of opioids -- make such a conversation politically perilous.

"There's still a lot of stigma associated with people who have an opioid use disorder," she said. "To decriminalize opioids almost means for some people they need to accept it."

Read the full story here.

 

[Painful One]

I love this!
Go Dr. Gigi Osler!


This is really what needs to happen. The "War on Drugs" has failed so hard and hurt and killed so many victims! Loved ones!
It is time we leave private business up to each individual. Many, many people have severe problems which they treat with opiates and are able to have a quality of life.

It is much safer for people who get opiates from the street to have easy access to pharmaceutical quality medication also.
This would solve the fentanyl crisis and with carfentanyl now available. Legalization is the only way to go.

It is time for all the "stigma" to be dropped also.

May God see this proposal be adopted by every nation on Earth!

 

[ro4eva]

Whoa. That's quite the proposition. I'll take it!

At the same time, I expect conservatives in particular shall be triggered. Because for some individuals, fearing 'radical' reform into uncharted territory is required so that we don't spawn Godzilla and then some.

 

[THE_REAL_OBLIVION]

Excellent idea. That fentanyl hysteria touches almost only recreational heroin (or until the point that it's needed to maintain normal life). This fentanyl thing seems like a cynical eugenics experiment and leaves a lot of chronic pain patients, and the last study I read says 1 to 3% of chronic pain patients who are scripted "way too much" morphine, oxycodone, whatever, only 1 to 3% of them think like a drug addict in Canada. I'd shoot myself if I suddenly did not get (my very fought for) 60mg generic oxycontin twice a day, after being on Methadone and Suboxone only because my previous maxilofacial dentist/surgeon retired leaving me out cold as he was the only one such kind of dentist in town.

 

[ro4eva]

Excellent idea. That fentanyl hysteria touches almost only recreational heroin (or until the point that it's needed to maintain normal life). This fentanyl thing seems like a cynical eugenics experiment and leaves a lot of chronic pain patients, and the last study I read says 1 to 3% of chronic pain patients who are scripted "way too much" morphine, oxycodone, whatever, only 1 to 3% of them think like a drug addict in Canada. I'd shoot myself if I suddenly did not get (my very fought for) 60mg generic oxycontin twice a day, after being on Methadone and Suboxone only because my previous maxilofacial dentist/surgeon retired leaving me out cold as he was the only one such kind of dentist in town.

The anxiety and potential panic attacks you must have experienced while in such a predicament wherein which you're essentially abandoned to face a horrific withdrawal is something I can empathize with because I too was hung out to dry without any explanation. And it's stories such as yours which enrage me the most because I've literally had to face that type of pain and it's uncalled for, unwarranted. I wish mere words could carry the substantive weight that the body's senses are forced to during such difficult times.

 

[THE_REAL_OBLIVION]

Thanks ro4eva. It's only stories of people in similar situations getting better that pushed me to persist, also a kind of way I have to speak for myself when finally meeting a doctor that can help, I seem to be able to pause all of that mental storm and go into "college presentation" mode when speaking to them even in the worst of situations that has helped. Indeed, you seem to know I have GAD...panic attacks not so much anymore, but I did have them, a long break from weed eliminated them. I smoke again now, but as a botanist I know told me, we make the damn buds stronger so that people only take one hit from a pipe or bong or something, not make 1 gram joints, where the anxiety and other issues seem to show up in people who use cannabis exclusively.

Thankfully I knew how to get opiates from an old man who deserves everything he's scripted from the 30mg HM Contins 4 times a day and the Ketamine cream and Cesamet right away, but he strangely, he had some empathy but to him his pain was much worse than anybody on earth so he thought like a person who's solely selling their scripts. So yeah, the wallet-emptying and credit card account hurting habits when dealt with in the black market makes many people just say fuck it and walk to the ORT cliniic where they leave with higher tolerances they had before coming in, yes they acknowledged my 2 pain issues, but it was 7 years just to get by, get hella methadone side effects (gained 100 pounds in less than a year due to the sugar craving it caused me to have) and almost all my teeth having fillings now, from the Suboxone pills's very low ph lime lemon fillers, I had 2 fillers previous to that.

When I got low enough on the bupe front, they moved me the pain clinic, with 60mg generic oxycontins every 12 hours..when I got in, a shot of 4mg Dilaudid or a 20 or 30mg Oxycontin or 20mg OxyIR got me by just fine. Hell that doctor who retired on me scripted me Percodans, up to 6 a day.