Opioid Related Deaths Overtake Gun Fatalities

A recent Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report shows that nearly 5,000 more people died from opioids in 2015 than in 2014. Both heroin and opioid use have exploded in the US, after decades of doctors over-prescribing painkillers in the 1990s and 2000s. A report from the CDC released Thursday found that the drug problem has become so deadly that heroin deaths outnumbered gun fatalities last year for the first time in US history. Until 2007, gun deaths outnumbered heroin deaths five to one, according to the Washington Post. But 2015 saw 12,989 people die from heroin and 12,979 die from gun homicides.

Years ago,young and in need of $$$,I signed up for a research study at a major medical school.It involved getting an IV infusion of Valium,Morphine and a placebo on successive visits.It was "double blind" meaning that neither I,nor the doctor,knew which one I was getting.

But I knew.

With the placebo I felt no different.

With the Valium I felt sleepy.

With the morphine I started to york my guts out.

I can't understand being a morphine addict.A food addict I can understand.But not morphine.

Much worse. The standard ER approach to a non-responsive is to search the mouth and all cracks and crevices for a fetanyl patch. Most of these DOAs have several drugs in their system. It has truly gotten rampant in the last eight to ten years.. it is picking up in numbers as drug use is normalized. Same thing happened in Puerto Rico and it declined, for whatever reasons.. The drug culture is strong and kids can earn more money selling drugs than getting a job that benefits society.
If you ever have to hold their hand and beg them to get their life straight, you will get it. It is a powerful problem that we have kept quiet about during the Obama years.
So I am torn.. circumstatially these girls are just trying to get by by trading their bodies for drugs.. The look in their eyes is surreal, like there is a light under the addiction.. a light that wants to leave it all behind. What they have done brings them back full circle and they are ashamed, hurt and then the craving starts. It feels better for a while.. terrible cycle.
On the other hand, there is the matter of choosing that life. It’s not so black and white in real life as it is on an ideological level.

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