The Oxycontin Express

DV8 · Post by **DV8** » Fri Jan 29, 2010 1:41 pm

This is a great 45 minute documentary about prescription Oxycontin addiction, a pharma-created version of heroine that is prescribed to treat severe pain. Enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7DHMqHFSB8

Cazmonster · Post by **Cazmonster** » Sun Feb 07, 2010 9:02 am

Holy Crap - yes, I will be watching this.

UncleJoseph · Post by **UncleJoseph** » Sun Feb 07, 2010 3:18 pm

I just watched the whole thing...very well done. I can confirm that, in my area, things are just as bad as the program make. While street drugs are still a problem, the illegal prescription drug trade is huge by comparison...for all the reasons the program highlights.

DV8 · Post by **DV8** » Tue Sep 20, 2011 5:09 pm

Drug deaths now outnumber traffic fatalities in U.S., data show

Serious Paul · Post by **Serious Paul** » Tue Sep 20, 2011 5:17 pm

I learned a new term yesterday. Croaker.

Raygun · Post by **Raygun** » Tue Sep 20, 2011 9:30 pm

DV8 wrote:Drug deaths now outnumber traffic fatalities in U.S., data show

Surprise.

AtemHutlrt · Post by **AtemHutlrt** » Wed Sep 21, 2011 2:10 am

I just don't understand how it is that every single manufacturer and distributor of this drug is known, licensed and regulated, and, yet, somehow this is a problem no one can figure out how to solve.

3278 · Post by **3278** » Fri Sep 23, 2011 1:55 am

DV8 wrote:Drug deaths now outnumber traffic fatalities in U.S., data show

I'm about as familiar with the dangers of drug abuse as someone can be and still be mostly alive, but this shocks even me. Certainly part of it is the drastic reduction in traffic fatalities - thanks, fucking airbags - but I wonder about drug deaths. The statistics in that article are all absolute figures - not corrected for population, in other words - so they're basically useless: I'd be interested to see the percentage figures [as represented on the map, less-than-helpfully] for the last few decades. I'll try to hunt them when I have a few minutes to spare.

Seems like the problem, ultimately, is in our drug obsession, taking them, prescribing them, abusing them.

Reading the article did that thing where I get irritated enough to start sweating. I can't help but feel some parenting is lacking in some of these cases, he said, referring to the deaths of other people's children as politely as he knew how.

Bonefish · Post by **Bonefish** » Fri Sep 23, 2011 8:14 pm

AtemHutlrt wrote:I just don't understand how it is that every single manufacturer and distributor of this drug is known, licensed and regulated, and, yet, somehow this is a problem no one can figure out how to solve.

Well, it happens when guys like me get proscribe pharmies for a minor injury/surgery. We take a few for our pain, then re realize we have an entire script of these things, and we don't want'em. So, what do you do? Ya sell'em.

You can't really regulate what happens downstream of the customer, who should be the "end user".

Serious Paul · Post by **Serious Paul** » Fri Sep 23, 2011 8:33 pm

I don't think you're discussing the same thing Bone. I could be wrong.

3278 · Post by **3278** » Fri Sep 23, 2011 8:33 pm

Bonefish wrote:You can't really regulate what happens downstream of the customer, who should be the "end user".

Well, you could certainly control it a lot more than we are. You could limit the maximum prescription amount, for example, that people would be allowed to take without returning to the doctor. You could limit the number of times a single user is prescribed the same medication for problems which are supposed to be temporary. And of course you can catch illegal users and follow their supply upstream, although our success at doing that hasn't been brilliant with other drugs. We could do more than we're doing.

AtemHutlrt · Post by **AtemHutlrt** » Sat Sep 24, 2011 4:47 am

Bonefish wrote:
AtemHutlrt wrote:I just don't understand how it is that every single manufacturer and distributor of this drug is known, licensed and regulated, and, yet, somehow this is a problem no one can figure out how to solve.
Well, it happens when guys like me get proscribe pharmies for a minor injury/surgery. We take a few for our pain, then re realize we have an entire script of these things, and we don't want'em. So, what do you do? Ya sell'em.

You can't really regulate what happens downstream of the customer, who should be the "end user".

You're absolutely right - that sort of thing really is very difficult to control, but one thing you could do is not prescribe this deadly, widely-abused drug for "minor" injuries. And I'm not certain what's different about regulation in Florida that allows this Oxycontin Express business to happen, but you could also consider not doing that. I mean, every other state seems to have figured it out.

Greater oversight and harsher penalties for violating physicians are, I think, perhaps the most effective ways to deal with this problem. Now, I'm not saying it's a good idea to do that stuff, but, if you're serious about addressing the issue, then I don't see what's so complicated about it. Like I said: we know where these drugs are coming from. Every single pill. We know who's distributing them. This is very different from every other modern drug epidemic. Of course you can't prevent "downstream" abuse, but there's a lot of upstream work that can be done. This just seems to me like one of those issues that's still so new, no one's really wrapped their head around it.

WillyGilligan · Post by **WillyGilligan** » Sat Sep 24, 2011 5:29 am

Coincidentally, I am now on Oxycodone. I've only had a couple of doses in the last two days, but I don't see what the big deal is. I hurt, take a pill, then I sleep, then I don't notice the open wound in my groin so much. Can't imagine wanting to get that foggy when I'm healthy. Or maybe caffeine and sugar own my soul and there's no room left for illegal drugs.

UncleJoseph · Post by **UncleJoseph** » Sat Sep 24, 2011 10:59 am

From what I understand, that narcotic effect you feel when you're in pain is somewhat different than the one you feel when you are taking narcotics simply to get high. The narcotic will cut through the pain effectively, and you'll be high from a chemical/biological standpoint, but the euphoric feeling is far diminished (unless you're on a really high dose) when you're actually in pain.

3278 · Post by **3278** » Sun Sep 25, 2011 1:40 pm

Before too long, it'll just be impossible to fake pain.

3278 · Post by **3278** » Sun Sep 25, 2011 1:42 pm

Serious Paul wrote:I learned a new term yesterday. Croaker.

Hmm. You don't suppose that's because a lot of drug addicts read fantasy, do you?

Serious Paul · Post by **Serious Paul** » Sun Sep 25, 2011 2:04 pm

Huh. Everything I ever need to know my Shaodwrun group will teach me.

UncleJoseph · Post by **UncleJoseph** » Sun Sep 25, 2011 4:27 pm

Serious Paul wrote:Everything I ever need to know my Shaodwrun group will teach me.

An excerpt from Tales of A Tenth Grade Shadowrunner, by Pauly Hume.

AtemHutlrt · Post by **AtemHutlrt** » Sun Sep 25, 2011 5:19 pm

3278 wrote:Hmm. You don't suppose that's because a lot of drug addicts read fantasy, do you?

Is that any good? I've heard it's good.

3278 · Post by **3278** » Sun Sep 25, 2011 5:37 pm

AtemHutlrt wrote:
3278 wrote:Hmm. You don't suppose that's because a lot of drug addicts read fantasy, do you?
Is that any good? I've heard it's good.

It's awful, and I've just read all of its Wikipedia articles, and a couple interviews with the author, and I'm about to go into the library and pull the books off my shelf and start reading them again. It's typical TOR fantasy: pulp, yes, but really fun pulp.

[edit: Hmm. Well, they're not on the shelves, to they're either in the boxes I haven't unpacked (because I don't have half enough shelf space for all my books), or I sold them (not at all impossible), or they're in Paul's closet, downstairs, with the rest of the "books I couldn't sell and didn't want, so Paul kept them, which thankfully gave his father something to read." That guy chews through books like me.]

Serious Paul · Post by **Serious Paul** » Sun Sep 25, 2011 9:09 pm

Ah spelling. Not job number one apparently.

Jeff Hauze · Post by **Jeff Hauze** » Mon Sep 26, 2011 12:40 am

3278 wrote:Hmm. You don't suppose that's because a lot of drug addicts read fantasy, do you?

It's also very possible to come out of noir (comics/films/literature/whatever). I'd actually hazard a guess that drug users tend to associate more with noir than fantasty, but that's just personal experience talking. Croaker is pretty much the noir version of street doc. It pops up now and again in pop culture, tracing as far back as The Spirit comics in the late 1940s. There's a few other examples off the top of my head: Sin City (I believe, I'm going from memory, as I no longer have the books), Things to Do in Denver When You're Dead, and some other 50's drug movie I'm drawing a total blank on the name at the moment.

AtemHutlrt · Post by **AtemHutlrt** » Mon Sep 26, 2011 5:09 am

Jeff Hauze wrote:I'd actually hazard a guess that drug users tend to associate more with noir than fantasty, but that's just personal experience talking.

From my experience, drug users tend to associate with Half Baked and Pink Floyd.

DV8 · Post by **DV8** » Mon Sep 26, 2011 9:39 am

AtemHutlrt wrote:And I'm not certain what's different about regulation in Florida that allows this Oxycontin Express business to happen, but you could also consider not doing that.

According to that documentary, it's because Florida (or certain parts of Florida, I don't recall) has no electronic patient database that gets shared between clinics. So you can take one repeat perscription for pain meds and go to different clinics with it to get your pills.

AtemHutlrt · Post by **AtemHutlrt** » Mon Sep 26, 2011 12:41 pm

Well, Florida should buy a computer, then. Maybe they could get a younger, tech-savvy state to help them.

Serious Paul · Post by **Serious Paul** » Mon Sep 26, 2011 2:42 pm

I suspect that this situation won't last forever.

3278 · Post by **3278** » Mon Sep 26, 2011 4:37 pm

Jeff Hauze wrote:
3278 wrote:Hmm. You don't suppose that's because a lot of drug addicts read fantasy, do you?
It's also very possible to come out of noir (comics/films/literature/whatever).

If that slang word came from that series of books, I'd soil myself in surprise. I'm reasonably certain the slang term predates the books, because I think the character is probably named for the slang. I just wanted an excuse to talk about the Black Company.

Jeff Hauze · Post by **Jeff Hauze** » Mon Sep 26, 2011 5:44 pm

AtemHutlrt wrote:From my experience, drug users tend to associate with Half Baked and Pink Floyd.

Only those loser stoner hippies. And Bonefish. Real users know better: It's all about crystal meth and Gwar.

Raygun · Post by **Raygun** » Mon Sep 26, 2011 6:21 pm

Couldn't have said it better myself.

Bonefish · Post by **Bonefish** » Mon Sep 26, 2011 6:31 pm

I thought real users watched whatever came in on that old cabinet teevee, because they'd already pawned everything else.

Jeff Hauze · Post by **Jeff Hauze** » Mon Sep 26, 2011 6:37 pm

Bonefish wrote:I thought real users watched whatever came in on that old cabinet teevee, because they'd already pawned everything else.

No, that's if you're one of those poor people from the South. It's definitely Gwar if you're a real user.