Opioid Epidemic? If only it were that simple...

I just finished reading a post by @rok-sivante entitled "The Unacknowledged Roots Of The Opioid Epidemic...". He ended the post with his very personal story about pain and the use of kratom. The whole time while I was reading the post though, I was thinking about the title and what the true causes of the "Opioid Epidemic" is. He certainly touched on a bit of it, but I came to the conclusion that we don't have an opioid epidemic, but rather that it's actually just part of a larger epidemic. The entire system is fucked.

He is right that America is in pain...because it's been smashed and cobbled back together again and again...and just like the American citizens suffering from the "Opioid Epidemic" isn't receiving proper healthcare.

When someone is in pain, for whatever reason, perhaps due to an accident or whatever, they are often prescribed some form of medication, likely one pushed by a manufacturer, because humans are simple creatures, and they don't really know any better. They know the name of the drug, and what it's good for, because the manufacturer sent someone to talk to them about it. This is a fault of the system. There should be studies that the doctors reference that test the effectiveness of medications, and then they can compare it to the side effects and the particulars of the case, and prescribe the right medication for the case. Of course, they should also consider how addictive the medication is, and other factors. Except the studies on the medication is funded by the manufacturer, who is also pushing it directly to the doctors.

The fact that the makers of the medication are funding the research into it isn't so bad...that's part of the business. Though perhaps that might be an extreme impediment to smaller drug manufacturers. The main problem is that they are funding the studies directly. Instead they should likely fund a portion of the research, indirectly. We need non-partisan researchers that research all the drugs and make recommendations to doctors on what to use for particular patients ailment and such. These researchers could be funded partially by the drug makers manufacturing different drugs, and the government, if necessary. After all, healthcare helps us all. It could also be done in such a way that new medications might not put such a huge burden on the manufacturer to research, if they are a small company, while larger successful companies would share a larger portion of the funding.

The whole idea of a manufacturer cozying up to a doctor and taking them out to eat and pushing their drug is just fucked up on all sorts of levels. While certain drugs might be lesser known...and perhaps the doctors could be helped to learn about them from some manufacturer, it's just been abused and really should go.

Back to the person in pain. The doctors prescribed way too much opioids to people because of the manufacturers, but they didn't even know about certain other options. CBD has just exploded onto the market and is actually gaining ground on opioids. While CBD is part of hemp, as well as marijuana, it's usually derived from hemp, but has nevertheless been a victim of the War on Drugs.

The War on Drugs is a major part of the larger epidemic that opioids are part of. The American government has become convinced that it knows better than you do on what you should do with your life. You shouldn't have the right to make your own decisions with what you do with your body and your life. But the combination of the extreme control the government takes over what drugs you can get along with a manufacturer pushing a certain drug caused the opioid crisis. No one could research hemp or marijuana for it's pain relief or anything else because some assholes in the government decided to make marijuana illegal forever ago due to a combination of racism and the cotton manufacturers pushing for it, because hemp was a major competitor to cotton, among other things.

Can we just take a moment to think about how fucking insane it is that we won't even allow scientists to research something? These are people that went to school for years to learn how to use the scientific method to determine things like how dangerous drugs are, and if they can be used for medicine, yet we have a bunch of politicians telling them that they can't even do their job, because they've determined it has no medicinal value, and don't need no stinkin scientists using no science hocus pocus to determine otherwise!

There are a fuckton of medications for pain relief. We should have doctors and scientist determining the best medications to use for different types of medications, and not tie their fucking hands.

And perhaps the person given the medication for pain should be given multiple options, and be made fully aware of the risks. They might even be given multiple medications, so they can choose to use one opioid for the majority of their pain, and add a bit of CBD or THC on top of that, because they're not addictive. Or they could use kratom. Or a morphine analogue. Or whatever the doctor prescribes based on actual fucking research.

Except all the research is done by manufacturers, so it's not like it's absolutely clear what the pluses and minuses are of different medications.

So lets go back to the person with pain. They're prescribed an opioid because that's what the manufacturer pushed. They might not even be made aware how fucking dangerous and addictive what they're taking is. Actually, they probably aren't. They might not even really be made aware fully of possible side effects. A few weeks later, after they've been taking the pills willy nilly to deal with their pain, they're now addicted. Doesn't matter if their pain goes away, they can't really stop. What do they do now? Nothing. They're fucked. America doesn't have anything even close to good healthcare for mental health or addiction. They can possibly check themselves into a clinic if they have a fuckton of money. But there's an epidemic, so it's not like there are a bunch of open spots in any place that doesn't charge an arm and a leg. Doesn't matter that the doctor and the manufacturer kinda were the cause of their addiction.

So this person is now addicted to opioids and out in the world on their own, just trying to fulfill their addiction. It's rather easy for them to possibly end up switching to another opioid that might be easier for them to get, heroin. Thanks black market. Thanks drug war. Thanks prescription system that makes it difficult to get anything without a doctor's say so.

They're actually lucky if they manage to just stay on standard prescription opioids. At least that's not heroin. If they're really lucky, perhaps they could even use kratom or CBD or marijuana to try to get off of opioids. Except they're trying to make kratom illegal. CBD was kinda sorta illegal a while ago, and assholes are trying to act like it's illegal now, because it possibly can be derived from marijuana. And, well, marijuana has been illegal for a long ass time. Thanks drug war. No medicinal value my ass.

One of the biggest things about addiction though, is having a support group. You need friends and family to lean on. That's really the biggest epidemic in America. We're all disconnected from each other in our dumb little cardboard caves. We need real places for social interaction that aren't like old folks homes. We need more places where people can go and hangout and meet people and have fun and make friends. And we need to stop making people go back to their homes and treating them like consumers that have to pay for everything or fuck off.

How many people are stuck in their house doing nothing, watching TV, while they just wish they had someone there with them? How many people are in a relationship with an abusive partner and can't get any help? How many kids sit in their room all day on their phone, not just because they're addicted to it, but because we have this fear these days that it's so unsafe out there, and even if we didn't, it's not like they have anywhere to go without spending a bunch of money.

It's no wonder we have an Opioid Epidemic. If we didn't, it would have been something else sooner or later. There's so much wrong with America, it's like a festering wound that's just getting worse and worse and no one wants to do anything about it, because fixing it would mean they couldn't milk us all dry for healthcare while we get sicker.

_{This image is a work of the National Institutes of Health, part of the United States Department of Health and Human Services. As a work of the U.S. federal government, the image is in the public domain. (source)}