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0 pointsloeg6y ago0 comments

Sure, that's one harm reduction technique that works as long as doctors (and Governments) are willing to prescribe the amount of opioids that addicts want. I touched on the same technique in an earlier, longer form version of the same comment (in response to a slightly different thread the other day):

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20973171

Excerpt:

  Given we don't have a magic wand, what can we do? Obviously we can't stop fentanyl
  from entering our borders or being synthesized illicitly here. We can (and have)
  leaned on illicit fentanyl-producing countries like China and Mexico to make those
  businesses less lucrative. We can do harm reduction things for the vulnerable
  population — which is mostly heroin users. We could legalize heroin with a
  prescription for existing addicts?

  Harm reduction stuff: Provide free/cheap testing for fentanyl adulteration? Make
  naloxone available without prescription, on the shelf, for cheap or free, and
  encourage businesses and residents to keep some around, even if they aren't users and
  don't know any users? Maybe provide monitored, safe injection sites where addicts
  overdosing can be assisted immediately if needed but are not arrested or forced into
  any overbearing programs. Maybe even supply quality- and quantity-controlled heroin 
  to these addicts for use on-site to reduce likelihood of overdose and even allow
  people to taper off if they want to.

It's still nearly equally magical to wishing fentanyl away in that effecting such a policy is incredibly difficult politically (US, anyway).

Pick any level of government. This doesn't really have populist mandate even in Blue states and you can be damn sure Republican Governors are going to reject any "give drugs to addicts" proposal on their desk, if it even makes it through state legislatures. Meanwhile, Congress is stalled with a Democrat-controlled house and a Republican Senate that won't pass any laws. I don't see Trump taking ... positive executive action on this, either.

Maybe some harm reduction can be done at the municipal level, but that probably leaves some of the worst hit parts of the country (rural areas in Red states) without help.

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mnm16y ago

Yeah we're going to continue to kill hundreds of thousands more people before this will even start to be discussed by politicians because our politicians are incredibly stupid and closed minded. But maybe if enough people die, things will change, possibly through voter referendums. I never thought legal marijuana would be a thing, yet it is (federal laws notwithstanding). Once people in states with referendums get tired of their friends and family dying by the thousands, maybe they'll act. Current politicians sure won't. But these primitive morons will eventually die themselves, hopefully sooner rather than later, and hopefully their replacements will be slightly less idiotic, more pragmatic, or perhaps even compassionate. Stranger things have happened. That's why we must continue to advocate for the only solution that has been proven to work despite the challenge of getting it implemented. One day we will look upon the drug war and its perpetrators the way we look at Nazis now. Or our children or grandchildren will. That I'm certain of. How far down the line, no one knows.

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