Posted on 11/18/2021 11:21:10 AM PST by george76
An absolutely gutting statistic on its face, which also plays into other flashpoint issues facing the country – including the COVID pandemic and the ongoing border crisis. We'll address both of those points below, but no matter how you analyze or slice it, this "top line" number – which offers partial quantification of suffering and addiction in our country – is just heartbreaking and appalling:
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More than 100,000 Americans died of drug overdoses during the 12 months following the COVID-19 lockdowns, the most overdose deaths ever recorded in a one-year span, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC's National Center for Health Statistics estimates released Wednesday show 100,306 drug overdose deaths during 12 months ending in April. That represents a jump of 28.5% from the 78,056 deaths during the same period one year before, and is more than double the number of deaths each year from vehicle crashes. The provisional data, which includes cases still under investigation, provides the first full picture of the impact of stay-at-home orders many states implemented mid- to late March 2020 to limit spread of the coronavirus. Although states began to ease restriction weeks or months later, some people in recovery struggled to maintain sobriety, while others turned to drugs to cope.
So of course this is "tied to" the pandemic. Addiction and overdose issues were absolutely a prevalent problem before COVID, but the new crisis pushed the existing crisis into hyperdrive. I believe that our elites have not even begun to grapple with the negative, ripple-effect consequences of many COVID mitigation strategies, including lockdowns and systemic isolation. This applies across the board, very much including massive disruptions for children, delayed medical care or detection for various serious conditions, domestic violence flare-ups, and drug or alcohol abuse issues. We may never have a perfect understanding of the trade-offs' impacts, but policymakers must acknowledge that there were serious trade-offs – a reality that has far too often been downplayed or outright denied. A one-year explosion of drug overdosed deaths is one way to partially quantify that reality. Some of those should be considered another form of COVID deaths.
The mention of fentanyl is also significant. The influx of this deadly drug into the United States has been exacerbated by the Biden border crisis, under which strained American resources have been directed toward huge logistical hurdles involving alleged asylum seekers. With personnel and resources devoted elsewhere, cartels and traffickers have taken full advantage, funneling dangerous people, drugs, and weapons into the country. And that's contributing to American deaths. This was an NBC report published a few months ago:
Federal agents in this section of the southern border say they’ve seen a staggering 4,000 percent increase in fentanyl seizures over the last three years. Those busts are not at ports of entry, where most smuggled drugs are typically found. The Border Patrol says the rising amount of fentanyl is being found in the desert – transported by increasingly brazen smugglers who are exploiting stretched federal resources. In 2018, the Border Patrol in the El Paso sector found just one pound of fentanyl outside ports of entry. In 2019, two pounds. In 2020, nine.
This comes as border apprehensions last month dropped slightly over September, but still spiked to an all-time October high (based on stats on record):
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We don't yet know how many "got aways" entered the country illegally in last month, which have been estimated to be in the tens of thousands every month. This isn't just a humanitarian problem. It's a national security problem. And it's a public health problem, given both COVID and the drugs disaster. I'll leave you with Biden's DHS Secretary sounding very pleased with this administration's performance at the border:
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More than 1.6 million illegal immigrants were apprehended at the border in the last year, plus hundreds of thousands of "got aways." A-level work, says Mayorkas.
Maybe we need another “vaccine”!
All part of the plan.
If anything, the folks behind the COVID cults probably find these numbers disappointing.
Way back in March of 2020 a psychologist (don’t remember who wrote it or where it was published) said “lockdowns” can only be for a limited time. Extended lockdowns would result in a dramatic rise in violent crime and drug and alcohol-related deaths.
Guess he was right. Did the “health experts” listen? No.
Now, let’s count the suicides.
Fentanyl overdoses were reported all over the news prior to COVID. Now, at least in my media sources, they have vanished.
We need to stop thinking about these OD “victims” as 100,000 people only. Think about them as young Americans between 16-30. When you consider that age group, 100,000 is a HUGE number.
And I would guess that these people are mostly young men.
Now...who would be interested in getting rid of 100,000+ young men over the next year or so. And what does that do to the demographics of the United States for the next 10-15 years?
I cannot imagine the CCP is making a ton of money from sending the precursors to the Cartels. But, that is where its coming from.
This should be viewed as the loss of 100,000 current and future communist voters...
At least they died doing what they loved.
Watch the blurb of the interview with Dr. Scott Atlas last night on Tucker.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TpVvamJ6WVU
Sums it up and worth a few minutes of your time....
Heroin first became a problem around 2000 in CA.
Its going to get far worse and the left is going to continue to use it as a weapon in conservative towns and cities.
If not for narcan, the number would be much higher.
CC
So how many dollars of welfare did this save? Did it help with the Climate Change problem?
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