[tialaramex]

The problem was never that they don't work the problem was that they're addictive.

So since they do work this means it remains appropriate to prescribe them, it just isn't appropriate to give them to everybody to pop one every day before work and say it's "non-addictive".

Drugs that work but have a terrible reputation are almost always still available. For example Thalidomide works, but it causes birth defects. Well, if you're a 45 year old man and the doctor can fix what's wrong with you using Thalidomide, what do you care about birth defects? You get a lecture about why child-bearing age women must under no circumstances take this drug, and then you're issued a prescription.

If you were a young woman, and there was no other option, you'd get an even sterner lecture, explaining that you absolutely must not become pregnant while taking this drug, that the best way to not become pregnant is to not have sex, but that if you're going to have sex you absolutely must prevent pregnancy, and if you get pregnant you must immediately stop using Thalidomide and come see a doctor... and then you're issued a prescription.

The main exception is drugs that had powerful societal bias (often driven by racism or sexism) against them, which might get outlawed even though if doctors were allowed to they'd probably sometimes prescribe them. In the UK these are "Schedule 1" drugs and it requires a specific government license to even test what they do.

[GeekyBear]

We learned the lesson that opioids are too addictive to be used to treat everyday pain back in the 1970's.

However, Purdue Pharma's claim to fame with opioids was that their time release formulation was not addictive, so unlike traditional opioids these could be safely used on a daily basis.

Obviously, this claim was fraudulent.

Opioids still have their place, for treating terminal cancer patients, for instance. Short term use after a catastrophic event is still warranted.

[frankfrankfrank]

You touch on the core issue, but I would like to highlight it. At the core, the opioid issue is not really about opioids at all, it too is just a symptom of a far greater issue, corruption, rot, degeneration of the system. And of course that manifests itself in ways like this "opioid epidemic" that is really no different than what Pablo Escobar or El Chapo were doing; they just didn't have the connections and were not part of the identity group that makes up the ruling class, something they may have learned even no amount of money can buy you into … ignoring all their less than sophisticated antics for a moment.

The Sacklers are just purely evil people that were part of the system of evil people who are the ruling class. That's fundamentally why they got away with what objectively is mass murder and even essentially treason, because the ruling class they are a part of is no longer a group that has the USA or its people in its interests. The American people and America are clearly well beyond their circle of interests and priorities. We now have not just the "opioid epidemic" to prove that, but the total and complete hollowing out of the American economy and also the complete burying of America under masses of debt. Not just the American, but the whole Trans-Atlantic ruling class are objectively made up of abusive, predatory, parasitic, evil people. Their actions and words speak for themselves, no amount of postulation required.

The only other alternative is that they are utterly incompetent to such a degree that they are mentally ill with something like schizophrenia or some other psychosis.

But one must assume that since they were actively and zealously behind all that they now lay at the feet of regular people of their own counties and societies (colonialism, slavery, etc.) that they too now are actively behind this new plunder and enslavement to debt and erosion of currency and value. Why would they not be, they have only ever gotten away with it, barring a few revolutions here and there before they learned to control them.

[subpixel]

I was given an opioid via IV to prep for surgery in my 20s and while that dosage was by design higher than standard Oxycontin prescriptions, people just use more OxyContin to achieve similar effect.

It’s very hard to describe the effect except to say it’s like a form of ecstasy (the feeling, not the drug) that is far more consuming and also more referable than I’d believe, had I not experienced it firsthand.

For years after that five minutes or so of being sky-high I could conjure up the physical sensation and I absolutely craved it.

The Purdues basically weaponized this chemical for profit, knowing full well the human consequences, and they should lose it all.

[sidewndr46]

The way I understand it is that time release opioids are in fact not addictive when used as directed by the manufacturer. However, they are also ineffective for most patients. As a result, doctors just up the dosage. This winds up being effective and addictive for many patients.

This is just what I have read, I have never been addicted to anything.

[GeekyBear]

They are addictive. Purdue knew they were addictive.

2007

>ABINGDON, Va., May 10 — The company that makes the narcotic painkiller OxyContin and three current and former executives pleaded guilty today in federal court here to criminal charges that they misled regulators, doctors and patients about the drug’s risk of addiction and its potential to be abused.

Also, in a rare move, three executives of Purdue Pharma, including its president and its top lawyer, pleaded guilty today as individuals to misbranding, a criminal violation. They agreed to pay a total of $34.5 million in fines.

https://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/10/business/11drug-web.html

2020

>Purdue admits it illegally and misleadingly marketed its opioids, including “to more than 100 health care providers whom the company had good reason to believe were diverting opioids” for misuse; illegally paid doctors to prescribe more opioids; and took part in other fraudulent and illegal practices. Purdue says it did all of this between 2007 and at least 2017 — after a separate guilty plea in 2007 forced the company to pay more than $600 million in fines.

https://www.vox.com/2020/10/21/21526868/purdue-pharma-oxycon...

[tialaramex]

Also humans vary in their ability/ desire to ween themselves off.

One of my acquaintances needed fentanyl lollipops to manage the incredible amount of pain he was in. Once the surgeries and other treatment were finished he got off opioids, in maybe a year or two.

[eterm]

> You get a lecture

It's stronger than that, you get a three page consent form that you sign to say that, for instance, you won't get anyone pregnant.

[rand_r]

The idea that opioids are addictive is a myth. People taking them are treating “pain” that isn’t diagnosed in the medical system. For example, joblessness. It’s an easy scapegoat for politicians to let them avoid dealing with harder structural problems.

[brennebeck]

>The idea that opioids are addictive is a myth.

They have literal physical withdrawals. The body becomes dependent on them. What else would you call that?

[rand_r]

Withdrawal from opioids is overrated. It’s unpleasant, but that’s it. Unlike alcohol or benzodiazepine withdrawal, which can literally kill you, opioid withdrawal is like a bad cold.

So, yes there’s adaptations, but it’s way overrated compared to the media hype.

[DaftDank]

I'm not following. I feel like you are trying to tell me the Sun isn't warm, and is in fact, cold. Opioids are most definitely addicting by any definition of the word.