The Sackler Family and Culpability in the Opioid Crisis

[tuppingtoncity]

Without a doubt, the Sackler family engaged in abhorrent and exploitative business practices for decades that contributed to the deaths of countless Americans. However, I can't shake the feeling the Sackler's are often scape-goated as this paragon of evil, the familial manifestation of capitalistic greed who are directly responsible for the deaths of any and all who have overdosed on opioids for the past two decades. I feel like this argument misses the forest for the trees. I think the Sacklers and Purdue's practices as a pharmaceutical company are not the product of one family's greed, but rather a symptom a capitalism that is entirely unavoidable when profit maximization is god. What is accomplished by placing the blame on one family? Maybe a few hundred million dollars in settlement money to be gained, but ultimately it allows for the profit-maxizing system that promoted and reassured the Sacklers every step of the way to escape largely unscathed.

As much denouncing of the Sacklers as there has been (which is absolutely deserved), it appears to me that little has been or even can be done with regards to making an effort to reduce the hyper-capitalistic impulses of pharmaceutical companies. Although because of Purdue there will very likely be no major pharmaceutical opioid over-prescription issue for quite some time (of course under-perscription is now an issue), I see no reason why another pharmaceutical company would be dissuaded from pursuing similar practices with another class of drug. The Sackler family, although they certainly committed fraud on a number of occasions, acted largely within the bounds of the 'law', and had a symbiotic relationship with the FDA who, despite being an agency filled with very well educated technocrats, put up little to no resistance to Purdue's practices. Why wouldn't a mid to large-sized pharmaceutical company not follow this 'legal' and highly profitable business model going forward? Are stigma, bad press, and ruined lives worth billions of dollars? I think to a lot of companies the answer would be yes.

I think the Sacklers are to blame. I think the FDA is to blame. I think doctors are most certainly to blame, and claiming ignorance or being deceived by Purdue is a ridiculous and frankly self-infantilizing argument. I also think there is some degree responsibility on the individual consuming oxycontin (definitely to a way lesser extent when you're being fed misinformation by medical professionals). But above all the rampant, hypercapitalistic forces that guide pharmaceutical companies (or any large company in America) are to blame. And it is my belief that these forces have hardly changed a bit since the introduction of Oxycontin three decades ago.

Hopefully, regulatory agencies and prescribers (who are the last line of defense against this capitalistic force) will have learned going forward. That is in my mind the only way to avoid any OxyContin-like situation from happening again, barring some major overhaul of pharmaceutical regulation or the rise of anti-capitalist forces in America (probably not happening any time soon)

Just some of my thoughts, I would love to hear what y'all think.

 

[Vastness]

Absolutely you are correct, I think.

It's certainly no coincidence that this happened in the USA, of course, the country which currently is surely the best example of what happens when capital accumulation and market forces are prioritized above any other human, moral, or just rational concern. Obviously disregarding all the other chaos currently playing out, which was a slower burn during the heights of the opioid crisis, just the very fact that healthcare is allowed to remain a commodity where the interests of private companies are prioritized over public health is obviously just asking for this kinda shit to happen.

I mean again really the uniquely dystopian hypercapitalization of healthcare in the USA was also a continuous slow burn of unnecessary death and avoidable human suffering even before the opioid crisis, the opioid crisis was just a particularly sharp peak on the graph of medical atrocities enabled by capitalism. For sure, looking at it this way although the Sackler family are 100% not excused from responsibility for their actions, as you say, overfocus on the individual crimes of one family, one company, one class of drug, etc., is all an extremely convenient distraction from the glaring horror that is the economic system that enables this kind of thing to happen.

IMO it's actually already happening again with the rushed (IMO highly dubious) approval of esketamine as Spravato and the absolute wild west situation of all these ketamine clinics. Obviously we all want to see the drugs we love brought out of the shadows into the light of more mainstream interest and study and the like, prohibition generally is just so horrific and we're all so starved of any kind of sensible drug policy that these kinda small gestures of legitimization seem like victories - but in actual fact the studies used to support the approval of Spravato are extremely suspect, there was essentially zero long term follow up and essentially negligible clinical benefit in the isomer that was actually approved. Call me a debbie downer drug conspiracist but the only reason I can think this would be is to enable the easy patenting of the S-isomer which was already produced and used for some non-psychological applications, thus had some degree of pre-existing basic safety data behind it, whereas arketamine probably would have required more research and expense and racemic ketamine I think wasn't patentable in a way that would give the manufacturers of Spravato an economic advantage.

More regulation generally of course is the way that the worst excesses of unchecked capitalism are controlled after the problems with prioritizing profit above all else come to light... although really there needs to be regulation on the scale of creating a properly functional public healthcare system such as exists in pretty much all of the rest of the first world... but it's very difficult to see a route to that happening right now. Amoral capitalistic market forces just have such a stranglehold on really the entire world but certainly quite uniquely the USA right now, where the rise to power of some of the most corrupt, profoundly evil people possibly to ever exist - at least considering the quantity of human lives that they can currently affect by their actions - has been enabled...

Obviously that didn't happen overnight but via an accumulation of gradual corruptions over a long time which have enabled malevolent capitalist propaganda and delusions to seep into the culture until any regulation is some kind of "censorship" and an "obstacle to growth" or some shit and any suggestion of the sense behind socialized healthcare is considered "communism"... Again, really we see this globally to some extent, but in the USA it's just extremely pronounced. I hope there's a solution in the not too distant future but my god.... things are pretty fucked.

 

[4DQSAR]

How the trick was done was in fact very clever.

It's recognized that for a sizable number of patients, Oxycontin simply does not control pain for 12 hours.

Now any rational doctor would first try swapping to smaller doses every eight hours i.e. no increase in the oxycodone consumed in a single 24 hour period.

BUT drugs reps in the US explicitly stated that consuming Oxycontin more frequently represented an overdose risk.

So doctors were told to increase the dose. This is why in the UK, for similar pain control, half as much Oxylan (generic Oxycontin) is prescribed - because here, doctors can and do ignore drug reps.

How does someone with a broken arm wind up on 80mg of Oxycontin per day? How dose the cancer victim end up being prescribed 160mg of Oxycontin per day? Not because a lower does doesn't control the pain but because a lower dose does not control the pain for 12 hours.

There are even records of instructions to drug reps to PUSH the concept of 12 hour pain control. So my question is not so much why it took so long for the DEA to notice, but why the DEA hasn't systematically arrested and charged every single drug rep who pushed the lie that Oxycontin taken every 8 hours was a potential OD risk. It isn't, it's a lie. A lie that destroyed lives.

 

[notsmokeymcpot42088]

Absolutely you are correct, I think.

It's certainly no coincidence that this happened in the USA, of course, the country which currently is surely the best example of what happens when capital accumulation and market forces are prioritized above any other human, moral, or just rational concern. Obviously disregarding all the other chaos currently playing out, which was a slower burn during the heights of the opioid crisis, just the very fact that healthcare is allowed to remain a commodity where the interests of private companies are prioritized over public health is obviously just asking for this kinda shit to happen.

I mean again really the uniquely dystopian hypercapitalization of healthcare in the USA was also a continuous slow burn of unnecessary death and avoidable human suffering even before the opioid crisis, the opioid crisis was just a particularly sharp peak on the graph of medical atrocities enabled by capitalism. For sure, looking at it this way although the Sackler family are 100% not excused from responsibility for their actions, as you say, overfocus on the individual crimes of one family, one company, one class of drug, etc., is all an extremely convenient distraction from the glaring horror that is the economic system that enables this kind of thing to happen.

IMO it's actually already happening again with the rushed (IMO highly dubious) approval of esketamine as Spravato and the absolute wild west situation of all these ketamine clinics. Obviously we all want to see the drugs we love brought out of the shadows into the light of more mainstream interest and study and the like, prohibition generally is just so horrific and we're all so starved of any kind of sensible drug policy that these kinda small gestures of legitimization seem like victories - but in actual fact the studies used to support the approval of Spravato are extremely suspect, there was essentially zero long term follow up and essentially negligible clinical benefit in the isomer that was actually approved. Call me a debbie downer drug conspiracist but the only reason I can think this would be is to enable the easy patenting of the S-isomer which was already produced and used for some non-psychological applications, thus had some degree of pre-existing basic safety data behind it, whereas arketamine probably would have required more research and expense and racemic ketamine I think wasn't patentable in a way that would give the manufacturers of Spravato an economic advantage.

More regulation generally of course is the way that the worst excesses of unchecked capitalism are controlled after the problems with prioritizing profit above all else come to light... although really there needs to be regulation on the scale of creating a properly functional public healthcare system such as exists in pretty much all of the rest of the first world... but it's very difficult to see a route to that happening right now. Amoral capitalistic market forces just have such a stranglehold on really the entire world but certainly quite uniquely the USA right now, where the rise to power of some of the most corrupt, profoundly evil people possibly to ever exist - at least considering the quantity of human lives that they can currently affect by their actions - has been enabled...

Obviously that didn't happen overnight but via an accumulation of gradual corruptions over a long time which have enabled malevolent capitalist propaganda and delusions to seep into the culture until any regulation is some kind of "censorship" and an "obstacle to growth" or some shit and any suggestion of the sense behind socialized healthcare is considered "communism"... Again, really we see this globally to some extent, but in the USA it's just extremely pronounced. I hope there's a solution in the not too distant future but my god.... things are pretty fucked.

I have heard spravado (esketamine) is quite different from ketamine --- enough so it isnt really worth having. But noone on BL responded to the spravado thread so im going off pretty unreliable experience reports

 

[Deleted member 593549]

the sackler family and doctors did not tell anyone to grind up 4X their prescribed dose and shove it up their nose or onto their arm in a needle.

they did not tell ppl to wash the pills down with a two shots of tequila and a xanax bar.

this blame of doctors and pharma is a total cop out of personal responsibility and blaming other for ppls personal decisions.

these institutions made a medicine that is a lifeline for ppl living with catastrophic suicidal inducing and disabling chronic pain. if you used the medicines for something beyond that purpose THAT IS ON YOU.

now because of this blame game and parents and junkies refusing to accept responsibility for their own decisions these medicines are impossible to get and the ppl that actually need them are suicidal disabled and hate every minute of their miserable existence because all of this bullshit outraged gave the DEA (which will all love) carte blanche to terrorize and arrest doctors and pain patients.

congratulations, you’ve destroyed the lives of innocent pain patients with this rhetoric and everyone just switched to fentanyl which is ten times worse. well done retards

 

[DeathIndustrial88]

It was absolutely wrong of them to market opioids as "non-addictive".

I honestly think it's a long-term conspiracy. I think they wanted to get the public hooked on opioids & then demonize & criminalize them further, so that all the people who are now dependent on or who enjoy opioids have to live miserable lives & play russian roulette with bullshit like fentanyl.

All I hear anymore is "opioids this" and "fentanyl that", especially from "right-wingers" here in the US. It's all fear-mongering bullshit to get people to give up their right to access pain relief. And depression relief for that matter cause opioids have always done wonders for my depression.

Alcohol kills more people annually in the US than any other drug on the planet & these same people fear-mongering about opioids don't seem to give two FLYING FUCKS about that. They act like opioids are just killing everyone on planet Earth.

Notice how countries that offering diacetylmorphine legally or who have over-the-counter opioids, don't tend to have a huge fentanyl & super potent synthetic opioid problem? Gee, I wonder why that is? That's a rhetorical question.

Opioids have saved my life many times when I was ready to end it. I can't stand seeing the government & society complete demonize & stigmatize these wonderful drugs. That in reality are less destructive on the brain & body in the long term than alcohol & many commonly used substances that are legal, every day. Sugar is terrible for your body. And it's super addictive. How many people die of diabetes & obesity? Nobody cares!

All this screeching about opioids is performative & it's part of an agenda to get people just willingly give up their bodily autonomy even more, so that "big Brother" can "protect them" from the big scary "opioids". It's exhausting living in a world with so much hypocrisy honestly.

Some uses for opioids :
Induces euphoria / heightened mood, which can help depression & anxiety problems.
Pain Relief
Cough Suppression
Diarrhea Suppression
Can help with insomnia & can do the opposite & give some one motivation & energy.

Are there any real benefits to drinking alcohol or smoking cigarettes?? I highly doubt it. Alcohol is basically a liquid carcinogen. Best used for cleaning industrial machinery & not floating around in large amounts of human blood.

Opioids should be legalized. They are obviously not without risks, but most things in life have risks. Getting into your car every day is "taking a risk". Playing sports is "taking a risk". Racing cars is "taking a risk". Why are some things socially acceptable but medicating yourself isn't? It's really wild when you sit down & think about it all.

We all remember the holocaust & we say "let's not do that again".
We all remember slavery & we say "let's not do that again".
We all remember when women couldn't vote & we say "let's not do that again".

Nobody seems to remember prohibition, but I hear endless people calling for MORE of it constantly!
Some states have even just made kratom a schedule I drug!!! Or at least are talking about it! That's PURE insanity!!!

 

[DeathIndustrial88]

I have heard spravado (esketamine) is quite different from ketamine --- enough so it isnt really worth having. But noone on BL responded to the spravado thread so im going off pretty unreliable experience reports

I've heard the same.

It's basically like a less "recreational" version of ketamine, or so I've heard. But I bet it probably does have at least some similar feelings to regular ketamine, which is why it's still controlled & all that.

 

[Deleted member 593549]

It was absolutely wrong of them to market opioids as "non-addictive".

oxycodone was schedule 2 from DAY 1. nobody hid that. schedule 2 is by definition highly addictive and EVERY doctor, pharmacist and even patient with google knows exactly what schedule 2 means.

stop believing the media narritive.

 

[DeathIndustrial88]

congratulations, you’ve destroyed the lives of innocent pain patients with this rhetoric and everyone just switched to fentanyl which is ten times worse. well done retards

I get your sentiment, but we have to remember not to point our fingers at the people who abuse shit or become addicted.
I'm a huge opioid fanatic because they're the only drugs that help my depression & pain. They also keep me from having any desire to drink alcohol or do worse drugs, which is ultimately better for my brain & body in the long term.

But of course, I'll never have a doctor take me seriously & give me opioids, except for the maintenance garbage.

The government is counting on pain patients to point the finger at "junkies" and "addicts". When it's not the "junkies" and "addicts" who make laws & legislation (actually, that's debatable, considering in 2017, the Trump admisntration was doling out controlled drugs to their staff like candy...so it's okay when they do it, but not when us plebs wanna take pills).

People need to point their fingers at the government, the lying scheming healthcare industry, all that...not each other.

Many "junkies" and "addicts" have physical & mental pain as well. If we had a functioning healthcare system that allowed people to have more bodily autonomy, we wouldn't have to have a "black market drug" problem in the first place.

Let's go back to the days of apothecaries. Let people do what they want to do. Allow them to learn how to do it safely without the fear of stigma, shame & imprisonment. That would solve 100x of the issues overnight, yet nobody in control seems to wanna go that direction. What happened to "pursuit of liberty & happiness"? What if opioids ARE my lifeline to happiness & liberty?

The drug war is absurd.

 

[Deleted member 593549]

I get your sentiment, but we have to remember not to point our fingers at the people who abuse shit or become addicted.
I'm a huge opioid fanatic because they're the only drugs that help my depression & pain. They also keep me from having any desire to drink alcohol or do worse drugs, which is ultimately better for my brain & body in the long term.

But of course, I'll never have a doctor take me seriously & give me opioids, except for the maintenance garbage.

The government is counting on pain patients to point the finger at "junkies" and "addicts". When it's not the "junkies" and "addicts" who make laws & legislation (actually, that's debatable, considering in 2017, the Trump admisntration was doling out controlled drugs to their staff like candy...so it's okay when they do it, but not when us plebs wanna take pills).

People need to point their fingers at the government, the lying scheming healthcare industry, all that...not each other.

Many "junkies" and "addicts" have physical & mental pain as well. If we had a functioning healthcare system that allowed people to have more bodily autonomy, we wouldn't have to have a "black market drug" problem in the first place.

Let's go back to the days of apothecaries. Let people do what they want to do. Allow them to learn how to do it safely without the fear of stigma, shame & imprisonment. That would solve 100x of the issues overnight, yet nobody in control seems to wanna go that direction. What happened to "pursuit of liberty & happiness"? What if opioids ARE my lifeline to happiness & liberty?

The drug war is absurd.

i’m not blaming addicts i’m blaming the people that blame medical institutions for their fuck ups of addicts. many of the ppl pushing this narrative are not or never were opioid users in any capacity. everyone has an opinion on it and the opinion of the layman seems to be that the sackler family tied ppl down to a bed and forcefully injected them with ground up oxy against their will

 

[DeathIndustrial88]

oxycodone was schedule 2 from DAY 1. nobody hid that. schedule 2 is by definition highly addictive and EVERY doctor, pharmacist and even patient with google knows exactly what schedule 2 means.

stop believing the media narritive.

Hey I never even said anything about oxycodone.

You're the one on here calling people junkies & retards dude. Chill with your fuckin ego bro. We don't have to get all hostile over this topic.

How about tramadol? Do you remember tramadol being unscheduled for over 30 years? While not the direct fault of the "Sackler Family", it still proves my point that they pushed drugs as "non-addictive".

You think the average American does any frickin research on their medications when they go to the doctor, except "junkies"? Most want their information fed to them by authority figures.

My mom didn't even consider herself a "drug addict" even though she was extremely dependent on high dose clonazepam for 40 years. Some people are completely oblivious to medicine & even over-the-counter medicine. Just because they listed it as a schedule II drug (which btw, I was a fuckin' child in the early 90's, so EXCUSE ME), doesn't mean the average citizen knew anything about it at the time. Just like people had no idea tramadol was an opioid for years & years except for stupid "retarded junkies" like myself.

I'm not saying people should absolve themselves of responsibility either. I don't blame any company for my choices & problems. I just stated that they DO lie to push drugs as well. That's all.

All the European medical literature recognized tramadol as an opioid, but from 2008-2011ish, I could walk into a pharmacy & say "hey my mom lost her 180 count bottle of tramadol, can I get another one?" and they'd do it! Because the "American" medical literature said tramadol was "just like another tylenol".

Until they all caught on eventually & scheduled that shit in 2013 or somewhere around then. But it sure as hell took them long enough. And I don't know how they couldn't have known it was an opioid from the get-go, it got me high as hell without a tolerance. I even prefer tramadol to hydrocodone, way more euphoric & stimulating. And now it's hard as fuck to get tramadol, except for surgery or some bullshit.

In a way, I could say their neglect to control it to begin with, lead to me being able to develop a severe opioid addiction, because I didn't care too much about opioids before I discovered it. But I never sit around being like "oooh it's all their fault that I'm this way now". I mean, sure they had a part, but I still made the deicisions. And I can't help that, things like tramadol & heroin helped my depression & helped me work & live like a normal person. So I don't regret taking them at all. If anything, I'm pissed at the crack down on opioids & them making it harder for me to use them to function & enjoy my life.

 

[Deleted member 593549]

Hey I never even said anything about oxycodone.

You're the one on here calling people junkies & retards dude. Chill with your fuckin ego bro. We don't have to get all hostile over this topic.

How about tramadol? Do you remember tramadol being unscheduled for over 30 years? While not the direct fault of the "Sackler Family", it still proves my point that they pushed drugs as "non-addictive".

You think the average American does any frickin research on their medications when they go to the doctor, except "junkies"? Most want their information fed to them by authority figures.

My mom didn't even consider herself a "drug addict" even though she was extremely dependent on high dose clonazepam for 40 years. Some people are completely oblivious to medicine & even over-the-counter medicine. Just because they listed it as a schedule II drug (which btw, I was a fuckin' child in the early 90's, so EXCUSE ME), doesn't mean the average citizen knew anything about it at the time. Just like people had no idea tramadol was an opioid for years & years except for stupid "retarded junkies" like myself.

I'm not saying people should absolve themselves of responsibility either. I don't blame any company for my choices & problems. I just stated that they DO lie to push drugs as well. That's all.

All the European medical literature recognized tramadol as an opioid, but from 2008-2011ish, I could walk into a pharmacy & say "hey my mom lost her 180 count bottle of tramadol, can I get another one?" and they'd do it! Because the "American" medical literature said tramadol was "just like another tylenol".

Until they all caught on eventually & scheduled that shit in 2013 or somewhere around then. But it sure as hell took them long enough. And I don't know how they couldn't have known it was an opioid from the get-go, it got me high as hell without a tolerance. I even prefer tramadol to hydrocodone, way more euphoric & stimulating. And now it's hard as fuck to get tramadol, except for surgery or some bullshit.

In a way, I could say their neglect to control it to begin with, lead to me being able to develop a severe opioid addiction, because I didn't care too much about opioids before I discovered it. But I never sit around being like "oooh it's all their fault that I'm this way now". I mean, sure they had a part, but I still made the deicisions. And I can't help that, things like tramadol & heroin helped my depression & helped me work & live like a normal person. So I don't regret taking them at all. If anything, I'm pissed at the crack down on opioids & them making it harder for me to use them to function & enjoy my life.

the ppl i’m calling retsrds are the ppl blaming a single pharma company (when thousands of the manufacture opioids) for a fentanyl epidemic, instead of blaming addicts themselves. that’s different than saying the addicts are the retsrds responsible for the eradication of opioids in medicine.

we have more addicts of a far worse kind now (fentanyl) and nobody gives a fuck because somehow the cartel is wholesome but everyone hates the sacklers

but let a pharma company (which retsrds love to hate for any reason) make money and ppl want to blame them for the actions of addicts. ppl are just miserable jealous little babies that hate rich ppl and it has less to do with a single pharma company selling a single opioid

 

[notsmokeymcpot42088]

oxycodone was schedule 2 from DAY 1. nobody hid that. schedule 2 is by definition highly addictive and EVERY doctor, pharmacist and even patient with google knows exactly what schedule 2 means.

stop believing the media narritive.

Dr are you really saying that they never pushed oxycontin as "non addictive" or "Less addictive" at very least.

Richard Sackler '"The launch of OxyContin Tablets will be followed by a blizzard of prescriptions that will bury the competition. The prescription blizzard will be so deep, dense, and white",.

How about the testing in the apalachians? The COMMERCIAL "Oxycontin ask your doctor for it by name"

WITHOUT THE SACKLERS -- GOOD CHANCE WE DONT SEE CARTELS USING FENTANYL -- Aren't most oxy's fent now. (Blue 30s particularly) -- hmmm. Btw was it the Cartels that marketed Fentanyl originally or was that a Pharma corp as well?

The use of retard however ya wanna spell it is unacceptable doc. I don't know awhole lot of people that have for the cartel.

What we are saying is these motherfuckers are equally evil and responsible as the cartel's.

Moreso in my (Very strong) opinion. Lets have this debate?

I will be plenty hostile, I got chemists working for pfizer in the "family" -- feel free to call me whatever you please (That BL will allow - ad homs only make you look bad anyways)

haha my dr did not like at all when he was cuttin in on bath salts and I peeped up "Scared of a little healthy competition?" I aint even gunna mention the RC benzo market to his dumb ass --- lol if I wasnt tech illiterate I would order many many grams (legally) and never pay him again......actually id prolly keep him in the back pocket --- be a much different relationship though lol

You are right though -- PLENTY OF REASONS TO HATE BIG PHARMA WITHOUT OPIOIDS BEING INVOLVED AT ALL. Insulin, that aids medication, all of it basically.

Counterpoint -- to people are just miserable little babies that like to blame the rich. NO; Not at all!, Not "all rich people" -- Specifically a family who has made their fortune LARGELY OFF THE SUFFERING OF THOSE SICK AND IN PAIN AND DID SO IN A WAY TO MAXIMIZE PROFIT AND LOOPHOLE THE LAW (at our suffering) FROM THE START WITH GREAT ENTHUSIASM.

That is a bullshit fallacy arguement: Noone said "Fuck the rich it is they fault we are addicts" --- More "Fuck the people that designed the drug, purposefully misrepresented and overmarketed it, kept addiction potential underwraps and kept the gravy train going until they were literally sued for for being MORE BASTARDLY THAN OTHER PHARMA CORPS. (That is a high bar of bastardly)

 

[notsmokeymcpot42088]

the ppl i’m calling retsrds are the ppl blaming a single pharma company (when thousands of the manufacture opioids) for a fentanyl epidemic, instead of blaming addicts themselves. that’s different than saying the addicts are the retsrds responsible for the eradication of opioids in medicine.

we have more addicts of a far worse kind now (fentanyl) and nobody gives a fuck because somehow the cartel is wholesome but everyone hates the sacklers

but let a pharma company (which retsrds love to hate for any reason) make money and ppl want to blame them for the actions of addicts. ppl are just miserable jealous little babies that hate rich ppl and it has less to do with a single pharma company selling a single opioid

So pushers are good people -- addicts are mentally challenged. (Selling addictive drugs to the mentally challenged is alright with you I can see. Guessing you an "Ends justify the means" thorazine zombie that pain in the ass type?

What you are doing is called victim blaming. Perhaps you should check in with HR over you vastly outdated perspective and speech patterns. (We can discuss if addicts are victims - there is plenty of room for debate there)

If heroin were to have stayed legal do you see people switching to fentanyl, ever? (Yes I know we got big pharma to thank for that sweet H too - GOD BLESS THEM, RIGHT? )

Had to come up with something to stop that horrible horrible morphine, what'd you doctors write it up as again "Gods Own Medicine" (Interesting) -- Replaced with Heroin (Worse) -- Replaced with methadone (Worse still) --- Replaced with suboxone ( more worse? )

Yup Pharmaceutical companies are pure as the driven snow and have never done anything but look out for our interest at great expense to themselves..... That is why the drug prices got cut 400% and they are paying us to fill our scripts now...

 

[4DQSAR]

Had to come up with something to stop that horrible horrible morphine, what'd you doctors write it up as again "Gods Own Medicine" (Interesting) -- Replaced with Heroin (Worse) -- Replaced with methadone (Worse still) --- Replaced with suboxone ( more worse? )

As someone pointed out, to young people who know no better, buprenorphine is still considered quite an attractive drug.

That buprenorpine would simply become the medication prescribed by 'pill mills' as the DEA exempted once-a-day buprenorphine and once-a-day methadone from their draconian cutting of so many genuine people living with severe chronic pain.

I talked to a French citizen who was prescribed a compound medication containing naloxone in addition to buprenorphine. Yet they still injected it. I did ask and they explained that since buprenorphine is a high-affinity ligand (similar Ki to naloxone), on injection they felt 'odd' for around ten minutes but then it was, well whatever injected buprenorphine is.

So the addition of naloxone was just a bromide for the DEA.

Being sublingual, hard to see how an abuse-proof formulation could work given that naloxone evidently does not stop abuse.

There always was, is and always will be at least some people who will inject almost anything that offers an ASC. One of the first people I met on BL admitted that they were compulsively injecting cyclizine. In the 1980s the UK was afflicted by a compound medication called Diconal™. Each tablet contained 10mg of dipipanone (a shorter-acting methadone homologue) and cyclizine. It's common knowledge that injecting cyclizine after consuming a 3,3-diphenyl heptanone opioid (methadone, dipipanone, phenadoxone and so on), a brief but powerful rush is produced. In the 1980s we saw a lot of 'Dike' shooters and then someone figured out that methadone + Valoid™ (a cyclizine-based travel sickness pill) injected provide the same rush. Then, when the methadone (or whatever) ran out, those users would whack up cyclizine every 10 minutes.

For us, Diconal was our own Oxycontin epidemic.

BUT the difference was that rather than our drug squad changing the rules, doctors were informed and now, while technically still in the BNF, no GP will prescribe Dikes. Becasuse perfectly good alternative exist that don't carry that extra danger. Education, not legislation.

 

[notsmokeymcpot42088]

I heard bupe was pretty popular for recreational use in europe before it got to the US as a rehab med -- but any googling I do of the era seems to turn up no such results so perhaps I am misremembering.

Coulda swore .2 was like the usual dose and it was discussed fairly regularly.

sad to see ppl START with bupe though. I be like "Cmon work the ladder, do codeine for a couple years, than vicodin....get the full agonists in at least before you commit to that shite"

 

[4DQSAR]

In places where it was OVERPRESCRIBED. People could just walk in, say they were taking handfuls of a 'classic' opioid and just get a buprenorphine prescription - which they sold to kids.

There is even a film called 'Reindeer Spotting' about buprenorphine addicts.

I have no way of knowing how much they typically shot but in UK prisons, for a while buprenorphine didn't show up in MDTs so new fish would smuggle in those 8mg octagonal tablet (Suboxone) and cut them into eight 1mg dose-units that were typically snorted.

Honestly, we did a random study at one prison and HALF of the population tested positive for buprenorphine. Now nitazenes are popular in UK prisons. When an ELISA test for them turns up, it will simply be replaced for something even worse. I can guess what it's likely to be but I'm not about to name it because I am 100% that lurkers read what we say and a few months later, the named drug winds up on the gray market! This has happened multiple times so now, now I only name things in PMs and even then, to a limited number of people.

I'm glad I spotted it because I put up the entire research into a new class, noted the rip-offs and removed the post.

 

[DeathIndustrial88]

we have more addicts of a far worse kind now (fentanyl) and nobody gives a fuck because somehow the cartel is wholesome but everyone hates the sacklers

Well I give a fuck! But I also get what you mean.
I've been dedicating all my online profiles to spreading education about heroin/opioids & convincing people that heroin should be legal. So I definitely care. I lost friends to fentanyl. They were people who had been doing heroin since the 80's and 90's and they were alive & well until they got that one bag of fentanyl, thought it was heroin & it killed them.

So I definitely care! It's like screaming into a void though to others when I talk about it though. Because you're right, nobody cares!

That's why my original comment in here started out with "sure they may have pushed addictive drugs but..." and then I went on a rant about how it actually pisses me off that it's harder to get opioids now. I think the Sackler Family scandal is a bullshit fear mongering campaign & they're using that company/family as a scapegoat to push their mass hysteria about opioids. They honestly aren't to blame for much of anything. If anything, they helped provide pain medicine to people who either needed it or wanted it. Unlike what our current government & healthcare industry is doing now, which is letting people suffer in misery & pain because "opioids bad".

I bet you & I actually agree on many things. Although I'd say there's a lot of blame on the cartels & China, when we should really just stop pointing fingers & playing the blame game & legalize opioids & let adults put what they want into their own body.

Heroin use to be legal in the US in the early 1900s. Didn't even need a prescription for it. We didn't have any of the problems like we have today back then. Society didn't collapse or break down because everyone was high on opioids. In fact, the industrial revolution came about afterwards (which may or may not have been for the betterment of society, but that's a different topic). Most people on fent don't even wanna be on fent, it's just all they can find/get.

We could solve a lot of these issues & prevent OD's & stop funneling money to the cartel, if people could just go to a store & buy cheap opioids for themselves. America is being dumbed down because we constantly let the government play nanny for us & tell us what's "good" and "what's bad". Yet everyone at the same time recognizes how little they truly care about our "well-being". So it's pretty ironic & pretty uncanny seeing opioids being demonized as much as they are. And I do think the Sackler Family & "big pharma" are taking the brunt of the blame, when it's a much more complex issue than that.

Drugs are never gonna go away. They'll just keep getting stronger & more dangerous & that's a direct result of prohibition.

 

[Deleted member 593549]

So pushers are good people -- addicts are mentally challenged. (Selling addictive drugs to the mentally challenged is alright with you I can see. Guessing you an "Ends justify the means" thorazine zombie that pain in the ass type?

What you are doing is called victim blaming. Perhaps you should check in with HR over you vastly outdated perspective and speech patterns. (We can discuss if addicts are victims - there is plenty of room for debate there)

If heroin were to have stayed legal do you see people switching to fentanyl, ever? (Yes I know we got big pharma to thank for that sweet H too - GOD BLESS THEM, RIGHT? )

Had to come up with something to stop that horrible horrible morphine, what'd you doctors write it up as again "Gods Own Medicine" (Interesting) -- Replaced with Heroin (Worse) -- Replaced with methadone (Worse still) --- Replaced with suboxone ( more worse? )

Yup Pharmaceutical companies are pure as the driven snow and have never done anything but look out for our interest at great expense to themselves..... That is why the drug prices got cut 400% and they are paying us to fill our scripts now...

go back and read my previous post. i’m not blaming addicts for this mess of fent and opioid bans we are on; i’m blaming the ppl that blame a single pharma company for somehow allegedly inventing the fentanyl epidemic

 

[SeekingOblivion]

At the end of the day, every adult patient with 2 brain cells, and certainly every prescriber knew it was all very addictive.