Posted on 06/06/2005 8:17:01 PM PDT by CHARLITE
The medical field of treating chronic pain is still in its infancy. It was only in the late 1980s that leading physicians trained in treating the chronic pain of terminally ill cancer patients began to recommend that the "opioid therapy"(treatment involving narcotics related to opium) used on their patients also be used for patients suffering from non terminal conditions. The new therapies proved successful, and prescription pain medications saw a huge leap in sales throughout the 1990s. But opioid therapy has always been controversial. The habit-forming nature of some prescription pain medications made many physicians, medical boards, and law enforcement officials wary of their use in treating acute pain in non terminal patients. Consequently, many physicians and pain specialists have shied away from opioid treatment, causing millions of Americans to suffer from chronic pain even as therapies were available to treat it.
The problem was exacerbated when the media began reporting that the popular narcotic pain medication OxyContin was finding its way to the black market for illicit drugs, resulting in an outbreak of related crime, overdoses, and deaths. Though many of those reports proved to be exaggerated or unfounded, critics in Congress and the Department of Justice scolded the U.S.Drug Enforcement Administration for the alleged pervasiveness of OxyContin abuse.
The DEA responded with an aggressive plan to eradicate the illegal use or "diversion" of OxyContin. The plan uses familiar law enforcemet methods from the War on Drugs, such as aggressive undercover investigation, asset forfeiture, and informers. The DEA's painkiller campaign has cast a chill over the doctor-patient candor necessary for successful treatment. It has resulted in the pursuit and prosecution of well-meaning doctors. It has also scared many doctors out of pain management altogether, and likely persuaded others not to enter it, thus worsening the already widespread problem of underrated untreated chronic pain.
Full analysis (PDF): http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa545.pdf
Rush needs to respond to this.
No consequence of legalizing all drugs would be as bad for society as the consequences we suffer now from the WOD.
SO9
They wouldn't like the Opiate/Eskatrol cocktails for terminal cancer patients either.
In America 140 years ago there were no drug laws, and there were no meaningful drug problems. How bright does anybody need to be to figure that one out?
I agree.
There is a pain killer that is non-narcotic, non-addictive, and has never killed anyone by overdose. Oh, nevermind, the SC just voted to prosecute anybody using it.
from the DEA agent's perspective and the federal prosecutors perspective..its an easy score..the doc does'nt shoot back, if he's any good at all there's some great local TV face time.......and usually some cash somewhere to clean out
That isn't much of a pain reliever, has connections to schitzophrenia and often gets mixed with other drugs as it's uses gets familiar.
Pain management is tough, and though people will get shorter lives with lots of prescribed pain medication, often doctors prescribe it because the alternative is they try and kill themselves form the pain.
I agree it seems like sadism to keep painkillers away from people in pain.
My next thing is a nerve block.
I get sick of people that know nothing of chronic pain trying to make laws with regards to it's treatment.
They should just merge the FDA and the DEA. At least it would be more honest, merging the scientific and propagandist with the propagandist and militarist.
Doctors prescribe pain killers because thats all they know how to do. Too bad doctors don't know half as much as they think they do.
The Drug War dates to about the end of Prohibition. Can't disemploy the JBTs can we?
These people are enemies of the Constitution and of freedom. They deserve the fate of the Tories in the revolutionary times.
Good point. The brain washing in our society by our rulers in the vast government bureaucracies is nearly complete. 99% of Americans today have no idea of true Liberty of the government our Founders intended. Many Freepers are even taken in by the so called WOD. It is a colossal failure and an affront to our Liberties. The WOD is another cancer that is eating at the foundation of our Republic. What most people don't understand is that since these vast bureaucracies have been created they are expanded each year with added monies (usually obscene amounts) and added personnel. To maintain the stranglehold over such a significant amount of our income these so called "servants" must justify their existence to the citizens. They do this through finding so called bad seeds. Raids are highly publcized as "protecting the citizens." It would be funny if it wasn't so tragic. I know many in law enforcement and most, if they are honest, tell you the WOD is a waste. But, heck, it's a job! Many in law enforcement partake of illegal substances too, showing another hypocrisy of this WOD. If our country can survive the cancer of Liberalism, it will have to survive the other highly corrosive cancer attacking our freedoms -- the unwinnable WOD. Most of the problems associated with drugs is because of the very "illegality" of the drugs and not the drugs themselves. This has all be much better explained by the likes of Milton Friedman and other brilliant thinkers.
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